“We’re delighted, sir, of course,” drawled Mr. Spiller, superciliously, “but what about the fair sex? Kiss-in-the-ring is a little out of date, don’t you think?”
“All nonsense, my boy!” answered Mr. Jenkins, cheerfully, bustling people about to form the ring. “Kissing ain’t out of fashion, whatever else is, I’ll be bound; and the girls like it right enough, for all their screaming and don’t-ing. A very good game. I like it myself, at my age. Don’t let the missus ’ear that, though,” he added in a stage whisper, with a wink. “Now, Miss Ruan, my dear, come along. There’s a young gentleman at your right hand that’s anxious to begin, I know. Headache? Nonsense! it’ll take it away. Won’t you, really?”
“There! she won’t play,” announced Mrs. Jenkins, as Bridget passed her to find a seat on the opposite side of the room, out of the way of the ring. “Not proper, I suppose.”
Mrs. Walker followed the girl with her eyes. “Beautiful girl, I call her. How well she moves!” she said.
“I’d rather have your Louisa or my Carrie,” Mrs. Jenkins returned with asperity. “An outlandish looking girl, I say—and proud as Lucifer, I’ll be bound. What for, I should like to know? My ’usband always would know Tom Ruan; he’s a very old friend, else, as far as I’m concerned, I draw the line at publicans. One must draw it somewhere.”
“It’s her schooling,” replied Mrs. Walker. “I’ve heard she’s clever. I daresay she’d put my Louie or Lizzie in the shade at her books,” she added, laughing comfortably.
“Well, what if she can?” Mrs. Jenkins returned. “What’s the good of it? A girl doesn’t get married any sooner for so much book-learning. The men don’t care about it, my dear. What they want’s a girl that can keep house and cook a bit, and make the children’s clothes. If she’s pretty, so much the better. Men will be men, of course.” Mrs. Jenkins laughed leniently, and shook her cap roguishly at Mrs. Walker, so that all the sequins on it clattered.
“There’s Carrie gone to talk to her,” she went on. “I suppose she thinks she looks out of it. Well, and it’s ’er own fault if she does. Her mother was always a stuck-up madam. There she is, over there. Looks young still, doesn’t she?”
Bridget sat on a blue plush sofa, working her heel savagely into the carpet. Her heart was still beating angrily in spite of a desire to laugh, which was inextricably mingled with a sense of shame.
“You came—you shouldn’t have come if you can’t have the decency not to ‘behave superior,’” she found herself repeating monotonously.