“A lady of strong character.”
“Cussedness, my friend, cussedness. The devil. And it’s brought her to this.”
The lawyer, however, shook his head gently. “Well, Mr. Munt, as I say, it is not for me to advise, but if she was a daughter of mine——”
“You’d be proud of her.” The sneer was rather ugly.
“In a way—yes—perhaps ... I don’t say positively ... because one quite sees.... On the other hand, I might ... I don’t say I should ... I might be just as angry as you are.”
The thundercloud began to lift a little. “Come now, that‘s sense. Of course, Mossop, you‘d be as mad as anybody—it‘s human nature. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry pointin‘ the finger of scorn”—Sally out of Quod yet was still searing him like a flame—“you‘d be so mad, Mossop, that you’d want to forget that she belonged to you.”
“It might be so.” Mr. Mossop’s far-looking eyes were still fixed on the pergola. “At the same time, before I took any definite step, I think I should give myself a clear fortnight in which to think it over.”
Josiah laughed harshly. “No, Mossop—not if you were as mad as I am.”
It was so true that the solicitor was not able to reply.
“When I think on her”—the great veins began to swell in the head and neck of the lord of Strathfieldsaye—“I feel as if I’d like to kill her. Did you see that picture in the Morning Mirror? And that paragraph in the Mail? It’s horrible, Mossop, horrible. And first and last her education‘s cost me every penny of three thousand pound.”