"I am happy to hear you say so, but I fail to see the purpose of all this running about. Why can you not be still?"
"Because I can't, because I won't!"
"Do you mean to have Lavisse?"
"Oh, don't talk to me of more engagements. I have had enough of being tied, I can assure you."
"Take care he does not grow tired of your trick . In my opinion you are playing a dangerous game." She added maliciously: "You are not irresistible, you know. Colonel Audley seems to have had no difficulty in consoling himself elsewhere. How do you like to be supplanted by a little nobody like Lucy Devenish?"
She had the satisfaction of seeing a quiver run over Barbara's face. Barbara replied, however, without hesitation: "Oh, she'll make him a capital wife! I told him so."
Lord George received the news of the broken engagement with careless unconcern. "I daresay you know your own business best," he said. "I never thought him our sort."
But Lord Harry nearly wept over it. "The nicest fellow that ever was in love with you, and you jilt him for a damned frog!" he exclaimed.
"If you mean Lavisse, he is a Belgian, and not a Frenchman, and I did not jilt Charles Audley. He was perfectly ready to let me go, you know," replied Barbara candidly.
"I don't believe it! The truth is you played off your tricks till no man worth his salt would stand it! I know you!"