“Ah but Tishy, I maintain,” Mrs. Brook returned, “ISN’T wretched at all. If I were satisfied that she’s really so I’d never let Nanda come to her.”
“That’s the most extraordinary doctrine, love,” the Duchess interposed. “When you’re satisfied a woman’s ‘really’ poor you never give her a crust?”
“Do you call Nanda a crust, Duchess?” Vanderbank amusedly asked.
“She’s all at any rate, apparently, just now, that poor Tishy has to live on.”
“You’re severe then,” the young man said, “on our dinner of to-night.”
“Oh Jane,” Mrs. Brook declared, “is never severe: she’s only uncontrollably witty. It’s only Tishy moreover who gives out that her husband doesn’t like her. HE, poor man, doesn’t say anything of the sort.”
“Yes, but, after all, you know”—Vanderbank just put it to her—“where the deuce, all the while, IS he?”
“Heaven forbid,” the Duchess remarked, “that we should too rashly ascertain.”
“There it is—exactly,” Mr. Longdon subjoined.
He had once more his success of hilarity, though not indeed to the injury of the Duchess’s next word. “It’s Nanda, you know, who speaks, and loud enough, for Harry Grendon’s dislikes.”