‘Remember that it’s a matter for your own consideration,’ Jasper replied at length. ‘You are living on your own resources, you know.’
Maud glanced at her sister, but Dora was preoccupied.
‘Why do you prefer to stay here?’ Jasper asked abruptly of the younger girl.
‘It is so very much nicer,’ she replied with some embarrassment.
He bit the ends of his moustache, and his eyes glared at the impalpable thwarting force that to imagination seemed to fill the air about him.
‘A lesson against being over-hasty,’ he muttered, again kicking the footstool.
‘Did you make that considerate remark to Marian?’ asked Maud.
‘There would have been no harm if I had done. She knows that I shouldn’t have been such an ass as to talk of marriage without the prospect of something to live upon.’
‘I suppose she’s wretched?’ said Dora.
‘What else can you expect?’