She looked at him, over her cup, while she drank, in several sips. “Do you know what they used to say in the Place? That your father was a lord.”
“Very likely. That’s the kind of rot they talk in that precious hole,” the young man said, without blenching.
“Well, perhaps he was,” Millicent ventured.
“He may have been a prince, for all the good it has done me.”
“Fancy your talking as if you didn’t know!” said Millicent.
“Finish your tea—don’t mind how I talk.”
“Well, you ’ave got a temper!” the girl exclaimed, archly. “I should have thought you’d be a clerk at a banker’s.”
“Do they select them for their tempers?”
“You know what I mean. You used to be too clever to follow a trade.”
“Well, I’m not clever enough to live on air.”