She was as cold as himself, and Mr. Massarene was divided between a feeling of great embarrassment and a desire to propitiate a person whom he saw was not easy to win over by any means. In his difficulty he said the worst thing he could have said:
“I hope, Lord Hurstmanceaux,” he stammered, pronouncing correctly the name as society pronounced it, Hurceaux—“I venture to hope we shall be friends; your sister, Lady Kenilworth, wishes it so much.”
“My sister’s friends are seldom mine,” replied Ronald with extreme incivility; then, fearing he might be thought to imply—as he did—something to her prejudice, added in icy accents, “I mean that her set is not mine.”
“Indeed! Is that so, sir?” said Mr. Massarene, surprised; for the mystery of “Sets” was still unmastered by him, he only understood Classes. “The Prince is coming to stay with me at Vale Royal,” he added; “might I hope that you too——?”
“I am not in the Prince’s set,” said Hurstmanceaux curtly, and seeming to the eyes of Mr. Massarene to become ten feet in height. The reply was altogether beyond him.
“Not in the Prince’s set,” he thought to himself; “what on earth can the fellow mean?”
“Don’t you go to Court, my lord?” he said aloud in his bewilderment.
Ronald’s severity relaxed despite himself; he laughed outright. Katherine stood by, indignant, ashamed, frozen by humiliation and anger into a statue. At last, in desperation, she turned to her father:
“Lord Hurstmanceaux would hardly care to come to us at his cousin’s place. He must have shot there many seasons. I think Mrs. Raby is looking for you. Someone has arrived.”
Mr. Massarene hurried toward his hostess and her tea-table; with a chilly inclination of the head his daughter followed him, and left Hurstmanceaux to his own reflections.