“Oh, much too much! Eugenia, do you not think such a price extortionate?”
Eugenia was silent, but her cheeks burned. Gerald’s lip quivered with anger. Only Mrs. Cathcart was calm. “I will pay you forty pounds,” she said, “but then it must be approved by a competent judge.”
“You have heard my terms, madam,” said Leigh curtly.
“Absurd! I will even say fifty pounds. If you like to take that you may call upon me. Good-morning. Come, Eugenia!”
She swept out of the studio. Eugenia followed her. She looked back and saw Gerald’s face wearing an expression of actual pain. For a moment her impulse was to run back, throw her arms round his neck, and defy every one. However, she did not yield to it, but followed her aunt to the carriage.
“I call that young man a most common, ill-bred person,” said Mrs. Cathcart.
Eugenia flushed. “He is not,” she said hotly. “Your manner towards him must have been most mortifying.”
“My dear child!” exclaimed Mrs. Cathcart, in innocent surprise, “and I was trying to befriend the young man? He presumes on his acquaintance with your father. I always told your poor father it was a mistake becoming intimate with persons of that class.”
Eugenia said no more. If she had thought of so doing it was not the moment to open her heart to Mrs. Cathcart. She went to her room intending to write to Gerald; but no letter was written that day. How could she ask him to call at her aunt’s after what had occurred?