“I feel for her very much,” she observed instead. “She must be the greatest possible comfort to her father, although he may not realise it. Yet he is forcing on the engagement to Marshire. She keeps up in the most courageous way, but she has ideals, and no persuasion will induce her to change them.”
He turned red, and said, looking out of the window—
“Ideals do no harm when, for some reason or other, we are unable to carry them out.”
“I cannot imagine what she will do, or how she will bear her life if things continue as they are.”
“What things?”
“She is like a slave to Lord Garrow. She is with him constantly, reading to him, and doing everything for him. She will be a cruel loss to his home when she marries.”
“I rather revel at the thought of the dismay which will attend her final capture of Marshire.”
“I used to hope that you perhaps——“
He glanced up and smiled with an air of satisfaction.
“I don't like the appearance of measuring myself against Marshire.... But—but he certainly seems, in character, the culminating point of mediocrity! In fact, Mr. Disraeli, whom I seldom quote, so described him.”