'It's only the smell of all these flowers; they make me feel faint-like,' she said.
'It's these lilies; they are too strong for a dining-table; just take them away, Sykes,' he said to the butler, who happened to be close behind George Clay's chair.
The man looked hesitatingly at his master, and then at the young man, and apparently decided to obey the younger one, whom he, like the rest of the staff, liked and respected, instead of the father, whom he detested, and who now cried in a voice of thunder, 'Leave 'em alone, I say! I don't pay for lilies to be thrown away for a woman's whim. Leave 'em alone.'
'They're cheap enough, and they really never are used for table-decorating. It must have been a mistake of the maid's. Sykes had better remove them, if you don't mind,' said George.
Sykes, being of the same opinion, swiftly removed the vase and handed it to one of the footmen.
Mr Clay, awed by his son's superior knowledge of what was done and not done (in society, he supposed), remained silent, and at last the banquet came to an end, and with suspicious alacrity Mrs Clay and her daughter rose and left the room, followed by George after his usual murmured apology to his father for not staying with him; for George Clay was as polite, in an indolent way, to his father as he was to every one else.
'Phew, I breathe again!' cried Sarah, as she stamped her feet outside the dining-room door.
'Sh, sh, my dear! Your father might 'ear you. The flowers did make the air sickly.'
'Flowers! It wasn't the flowers. It was everything. I always think of Miss Kilmansegg and her "Gold, gold; nothing but gold!" Phew! how I loathe and detest it all!'
'Draw it mild, Sarah! Even gold has its advantages.'