"I will not allow you to sully your mind with such filth. It only goes to prove what I have so often told you, that your sister is not a proper associate for any young woman. A book of that description—faugh!"
Bella picked up the offending volume and looked ruefully at its battered condition. "I should have supposed that as a married woman I might read anything," she said with an assumption of dignity.
"Why should you be less pure because you have a husband, my child? Don't run away with any such notion."
"Well, I will read it and give you my opinion of it."
"You will do no such thing. I forbid it, Bella."
"In a matter like this I shall judge for myself." Her cheeks were scarlet, and she kept her eyes downbent.
"I will not—"
"Bella!"
It was the first time in their married life that she had defied him, and he looked at her in utter astonishment.
"Yes," she cried, turning on him like a small fury, with the book tightly held in both hands; "I'm not a child to be dictated to and ordered to do this and that. I'm perfectly well able to act for myself and I intend to do so now and always. I'm sick of your eternal fault-finding, and the sooner you know it the better. If it's not one thing it's another. Nothing I do is right and I'm about tired of it."