"I wonder what sort of a flirter Caro finds Lord Maxwell. Of course he's stupid, for is he not a man? I heard Mrs. Yorke say yesterday that people began to talk as if Maxwell would marry Carolyn. She may be the countess in the family, after all. Then mamma can say, 'My niece, Lady Maxwell,' instead of 'My daughter, Lady Maxwell.' Of course it won't be quite so fine, but it will do. I suppose Caro will visit every cottage on his lordship's estate, and will make no end of flannel petticoats. In novels, you know, the good lady carries petticoats and strong soups to the poor, and reads to them. Can't you see Caro doing that, Rodney?"
Lawrence lay with his eyes closed. He opened them now to glance at his wife. She was looking full at him, and their mutual gaze met as two shining bits of steel might meet. It almost seemed as if one listening might have heard the clash of metal on metal.
Lawrence immediately closed his eyes again.
"Can't you see Caro doing that?" repeated Prudence, relentlessly.
"I haven't an active imagination like you," he answered, at last.
Prudence, after a moment, turned to her writing again. Her husband lay there, and heard her pen going over the paper.
He began to think more calmly, and it came to him that he had not done a good thing in telling Prudence that he had never loved her. There was no need of his saying that. He would give much now if he could recall those words; but he knew he could not remove the sting of them. What a brute he had been! What a very different person he was, every way, from the person he had meant to be! He did not feel able to understand it all. He wished he could banish the memory of Carolyn's lovely, truthful face. He was sorry he had seen her. Did human beings always want the thing they could not have?
For what seemed a long time, he heard his wife's pen on the paper; then the noise grew indistinct, and Lawrence knew that he was going to sleep, and was thankful for the knowledge.
But he did not sleep long. Nothing special awakened him, however. He opened his eyes; they rested on Prudence, who had stopped writing. She was sitting with her hands folded on her lap, gazing at him. How old and hard her face appeared! She smiled immediately, smiled brilliantly and without any softness.