"She has a pretty, piquant little face," murmured Mr. Roebuck meekly, not liking to be enthusiastic about beauty which was the very opposite of his wife's Roman-nosed and flaxen-haired style.
Upon Mrs. Mornington the blow fell far more heavily than on Suzette's father, who was very glad to keep his daughter at home, albeit regretful that she should have treated a faithful lover so scurvily.
"If the poor child did not know her own mind at the beginning, it's a blessed thing she found out her mistake before it was too late," pleaded the General to his irate sister.
"It is too late—too late for respectability—too late for common humanity. To lead a young man on for over a year, almost to the foot of the altar, and then to throw him off. It is simply shameful! To make a fool of him and herself before the whole neighbourhood—to belittle herself as much as she has belittled him. No doubt all the women will say that he has jilted her."
"Let them. That cannot hurt her."
"But it can hurt me, her aunt. I feel inclined to slap my most intimate friends when they ask me leading questions, evidently longing to hear that Allan has acted badly. And when I assure them that my niece is alone to blame, I can see in their faces that they don't, or won't, believe me. And why should they believe me? Could any girl, not an idiot, throw over such a match as Allan has become since his father's death?"
"I hope you don't mean to say that my girl is an idiot?"
"I say that she has acted like an idiot in this affair."
"And I say that she has acted like an honest woman."