"Oh, you are very transparent. One sees that you are always troubling yourself about the right and wrong of things."
"All very well for one's self," said Delafield, trying to laugh. "I hope I don't seem to you to be setting up as a judge of other people's right and wrong?"
"Yes, yes, you do!" she said, passionately. Then, as he winced, "No, I don't mean that. But you do judge--it is in your nature--and other people feel it."
"I didn't know I was such a prig," said Delafield, humbly. "It is true I am always puzzling over things."
Julie was silent. She was indeed secretly convinced that he no more approved the escapade of the night before than did Sir Wilfrid Bury. Through the whole evening she had been conscious of a watchful anxiety and resistance on his part. Yet he had stood by her to the end--so warmly, so faithfully.
He sat down beside her, and Julie felt a fresh pang of remorse, perhaps of alarm. Why had she called him to her? What had they to do with each other? But he soon reassured her. He began to talk of Meredith, and the work before her--the important and glorious work, as he naïvely termed it, of the writer.
And presently he turned upon her with sudden feeling.
"You accused me, just now, of judging what I have no business to judge. If you think that I regret the severance of your relation with Lady Henry, you are quite, quite mistaken. It has been the dream of my life this last year to see you free--mistress of your own life. It--it made me mad that you should be ordered about like a child--dependent upon another person's will."
She looked at him curiously.
"I know. That revolts you always--any form of command? Evelyn tells me that you carry it to curious lengths with your servants and laborers."