He stared.
'You aren't serious?' said Lady John.
'Haven't you noticed,' Miss Levering put it to Trent, 'that all our worst disturbances come when men are in charge?'
'Ha! ha! Well—a—I hadn't connected the two ideas.'
Still laughing a little ruefully, he suffered himself to be taken downstairs by kind little Miss Dunbarton, who had stood without a word waiting there with absent face.
'That nice boy's in love with you,' said Lady John, sotto voce.
Vida looked at her without answering.
'Good-bye.' They shook hands. 'I wish you hadn't been so unkind to that nice boy.'
'Do you?'
'Yes; for then I would be more sure of your telling Geoffrey Stonor that intelligent women don't nurse their wrongs indefinitely, and lie in wait to punish them.'