Alice stood still, so great was her astonishment. "Oh, dear no! I'm perfectly certain he doesn't. What an absurd idea for that dear old thing to get into her head! But she is so busy finding long words that her wits are apt to go wool-gathering, don't you think?"
"Yes, I do. She was delicious to-day. I did wish that you and Paul had been there too. It seemed a pity for her sweetness to be wasted on the desert air of my solitary self."
"Was she really fine?" asked Alice.
"I should just think she was. She was like a penny-a-liner and an eighteenth-century poet rolled in one.
"That really was an idiotic thing to say about Edgar; because, do you know, Joanna? he has been positively horrid to me lately."
"Has he?"
"Yes, something awful. I can't make out why, because I've never been nasty to him, that I know of."
"You never are nasty to anybody, dear."
"I never want to be," said Alice. "I am always so dreadfully anxious to be liked that I try my best to be nice to people; and when they don't like me it makes me so wretched that I want to cry."
"I never mind whether people like me or not."