"Dear old Daddy. It is silly of him. As if anything mattered but
Colin."
"You matter. You see, your father doesn't like your being here alone with him. He's afraid of what people may think."
"I'm not. I don't care what people think. They've no business to."
"No; but they will, and they do…You know what I mean, Anne, don't you?"
"I suppose you mean they think I'm Colin's mistress. Is that it?"
"I'm afraid it is. They can't think anything else. It's beastly of them, I know, but this is a beastly world, dear, and it doesn't do to go on behaving as if it wasn't."
"I don't care. If people are beastly it's their look-out, not mine. The beastlier they are the less I care."
"I don't suppose you care if the vicar's wife won't call or if Lady
Corbett and the Hawtreys cut you. But that's why."
"Is it? I never thought about it. I'm too busy to go and see them and I supposed they were too busy to come and see me. I certainly don't care."
"If it was people you cared about?"