"Why didn't you go with her?"
"I rarely do go with her, papa. Our sets are quite different; and I have other duties."
"Duties, pshaw! Messing with those paint-brushes; you don't call that duty,
I hope? You had much better have gone out with your stepmother."
"I was not wanted, papa. Mrs. Granger has engagements which do not in the least concern me. I should only be in the way."
"What do you mean by that, Sophia?" asked her father sternly. "And what do you mean by calling my wife Mrs. Granger?"
"There are some people so uncongenial to each other, papa, that any pretence of friendship can be only the vilest hypocrisy," replied Sophia, turning very pale, and looking her father full in the face, like a person prepared to do battle.
"I am very sorry to hear this, Sophia," said Mr. Granger, "for if this is really the case, it will be necessary for you to seek some other home. I will have no one in my house who cannot value my wife."
"You would turn me out of doors, papa?"
"I should certainly endeavour to provide you with a more congenial—congenial, that was the word you used, I think—more congenial home."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Sophia. "Then I suppose you quite approve of all my stepmother's conduct—of her frequent, almost daily visits to such a person as Mr. Austin?"