"I've seen her. I was there this afternoon. I can't say that I found her very interesting. Plain-ugly in fact. She never opened her mouth all the afternoon. Caroline Smith tells me that she knows nothing at all, seen nothing, been nowhere. Bad-tempered I should think."
"Dear, dear," said Mr. Thurston with a gratified sigh, "is it so reelly?"
Martin looked across at his sister indignantly. "Trust one woman about another," he said. "Just because she doesn't chatter like a magpie you concluded she's got nothing to say. It's even conceivable that she found you dull, Amy."
Amy looked at him with a strange penetrating glance that in some undefined way increased his irritation. "It's quite possible," she said quietly. "But I don't think even you, Martin, can call her handsome. As to her intelligence, she never gave me a chance of judging."
"I've been there several times," said Martin hotly. "I like her immensely." He felt as soon as he had spoken that it had been a foolish thing to say. He saw Mr. Thurston smile. In the pause that followed he felt as though he had with a gesture of the hand flung a stone into a pool of chatter and scandal whose ripples might spread far beyond his control. At that moment he hated his sister.
"I didn't know you knew her so well, dear," said his mother.
"I don't know her," he said, "I've only seen her three times. But she ought to be given her chance. It can't be much fun for her coming here where she knows no one—after her father suddenly dying. I believe she was all alone with him."
He had expected his father to defend her. He remembered that he had apparently liked her. But his father said nothing. There was an awkward and uncomfortable pause. After supper Mr. Thurston rubbed his hands, helped Amy Warlock into her cloak, said to the company in general:
"Good night. Should be a very full meeting to-night ... Well, well ... Thank you for your kindness, Mrs. Warlock, I'm sure."
The door was closed, Mrs. Warlock retired into her bedroom; the house was left to Martin and his father.