"Oh, no, mamma, believe me, you have taken his side, unconsciously to yourself. And, equally unconsciously, you have, from the very first, set yourself against her, and deplored my infatuation. I have always seen it."
"I confess that some things you told me prejudiced me against her. I felt that her personal attraction must be great to make you overlook them."
"You mean her telling me things against her husband, even as early as our first interview."
"And her indifference to her children, Missy, and her great egotism."
"I can understand, mamma, how this would strike you. I am quite sure if you had known her, you would not have wondered, or blamed; you would only have pitied. She spoke to me because she saw my friendship, and because, poor soul, she had seen no one but the servants for weeks or months. I shouldn't have wondered if she had told me her whole history the first time that I saw her."
"But she never did tell you her whole history, Missy. You know nothing of it really, notwithstanding all the time you spent with her."
"And that you find against her! Really, mamma, you are hard to please. You reproach her for telling me so much, and you distrust her because she did not tell me more."
"Vague accusations, and complaints of injustice are easily made, Missy. I should think we were in a better position to judge of matters, if you had ever had a plain story of her life and its wrongs given to you."
"I wish, for your sake, that I had; but perhaps it was more noble in her to die without doing it. I am afraid, mamma, we shall never think alike about this. But if you can't sympathize with me, at least do not try me by too much approbation of this man. I will bear anything in reason; but if you and Aunt Harriet and St. John all continue to pay homage to him as you did to-night, I shall think it rather trying."
"Oh, as to that, I think we were only civil; and you were quite as amiable as we—which, my dear, you must continue to be, if you hope to keep any hold over Jay's fate. Poor little fellow! do not, by an unnecessary show of rancor, throw him back into the arms of Alphonsine and Bridget."