"How does Sibylla meet it?" was her first question when she had listened to the end.
"Not very well," he answered, after a momentary hesitation. "Who could meet it well?" "Lionel, it is a judgment upon her. She—"
Lionel started up, his brow flushing.
"I beg your pardon, mother. You forget that you are speaking of my wife. She is my wife," he more calmly added, "until she shall have been proved not to be."
No. Whatever may have been Sibylla's conduct to him personally, neither before her face nor behind her back, would Lionel forget one jot of the respect due to her. Or suffer another to forget it; although that other should be his mother.
"What shall you do with her, Lionel?"
"Do with her?" he repeated, not understanding how to take the question.
"When the man makes himself known?"
"I am content to leave that to the time," replied Lionel, in a tone that debarred further discussion.
"I knew no good would come of it," resumed Lady Verner, persistent in expressing her opinion. "But for the wiles of that girl you might have married happily, might have married Mary Elmsley."