"I shall not let you go. If you have any gratitude in you, you will remain and help me to manage the house."
"You have Miss Pewsey."
"She is not a relative, you are."
"And so you treat me worse than you do her. Well, Aunt Sophia, I am not ungrateful though you seem to think I am. I shall stop with you. I only ask for a little more consideration."
"I give you every consideration. As for love, I cannot give it to you or to anyone. I gave all the love my nature was capable of feeling to Markham Ainsleigh, and he rejected my love. Yes, you may look astonished, but it was this man's father who broke my heart."
"And that is why you don't want Rupert to marry me."
"That is the reason," said Miss Wharf sitting down and growing more her calm stony self. "I was almost engaged to Markham Ainsleigh: but he saw Violet Vane and fell in love with her. He left me and made her his wife. Can you wonder that I hate the son of the woman who stole my love away from me?"
"Rupert is the son of the man you loved----"
"And of the man who cheated me. Look at my lonely life, at my starved heart. I hate the Ainsleighs--there's only one left but I hate him. And when I heard Markham was murdered in China I was glad--yes, very glad."
"What an unforgiving nature you have."