Mrs. Tenssen looked at him scornfully.
"You're in love with her, aren't you?" she asked.
"I'd rather not talk to you about what I feel," Henry answered.
"Of course you're in love with her," Mrs. Tenssen continued. "I don't suppose she cares a rap for you. She doesn't seem to take after men at all, and you're not, if you'll forgive my saying so, altogether a beauty. You're young yet. But she'd do anything to get away from me. Don't I know it and haven't I had to make my plans carefully to prevent it? So long as her blasted uncles keep out of this country for the next six months, with me she's got to stay, and she knows it. But time's getting short, and I've got to make my mind up. There are one or two other offers I'm considering, but I don't in the least object to hearing any suggestion you'd like to make."
"One suggestion I'd like to make," said Henry hotly, "is that I can get the police on your track for keeping a disorderly house. They'll take her away soon enough when they know what you've got in Victoria Street."
"Now then," said Mrs. Tenssen calmly, "that comes very near to libel. You be careful of libel, young man. It's got many a prettier fellow than you into trouble before now. Nobody's ever been able to prove a thing against me yet and it's not likely a chicken like you is going to begin now. Besides, supposing you could, a pretty thing it would be for Christina to be 'dragged into such an affair in the Courts.' No thank you. I can look after my girl better than that."
Mrs. Tenssen got up, went to a mirror to put her hat straight, and then turned round upon him. She stood, her arms akimbo, looking down upon him.
"I don't understand you virtuous people," she said, "upon my word I don't. You make such a lot of fine talk about your nobility and your high conduct and then you go and do things that no old drab in the street would lower herself to. Here are you, been sniffing round my daughter for months and haven't got the pluck to lift a finger to take her out of what you think her misery and make her happy. Oh, I loathe you good people, damn the lot of you. You can go to hell for all I care, so you bloody well can. . . . You'd better make the most of your Christina while you've got the chance. You won't be coming here many more times." With that she was gone, banging the door behind her.
Christina came in, smiled at him without speaking, carried the dirty remnants of her mother's meal into the inner room, returned and sat down, a book in her hand, close to him.