“Well, then, if I admit it for you, that’s all that’s required.”
The brother and sister considered each other a while in silence, as if each were tasting, agreeably, the distinction the other conferred; then Muniment said, “If I’m such an awfully superior chap, why shouldn’t I behave in keeping?”
“Oh, you do, you do!”
“All the same, you don’t like it.”
“It isn’t so much what you do; it’s what she does.”
“How do you mean, what she does?”
“She makes Lady Aurora suffer.”
“Oh, I can’t go into that,” said Paul. “A man feels like a muff, talking about the women that ‘suffer’ for him.”
“Well, if they do it, I think you might bear it!” Rosy exclaimed. “That’s what a man is. When it comes to being sorry, oh, that’s too ridiculous!”
“There are plenty of things in the world I’m sorry for,” Paul rejoined, smiling. “One of them is that you should keep me gossiping here when I want to go out.”