“I have to apologize for asking you, but I should be glad to know—I suppose you mean to marry Brancepeth?”
She threw back her head and looked at him with distended nostrils breathing defiance.
“Pray why should I marry Lord Brancepeth?”
Hurstmanceaux hesitated; he was astonished and embarrassed.
“Well, everybody expects you to do so; it would be natural and proper that you should; it is the only thing you can do to—to——”
He paused; he had never spoken to her of Brancepeth, it hurt him to do so; he grew red with embarrassment for her. He could not have used any words which could have stung, infuriated and embittered her more than these unfortunate and far too candid phrases. Coming after the scene of an hour before, they were like petroleum poured on a leaping flame.
“Lord Brancepeth did me the honor to offer me his hand a few minutes ago; I refused it,” she said between her teeth. “I am entirely at a loss to know why you and ‘everybody’ consider that I ought to marry a penniless guardsman who has nothing to recommend him but a handsome face.”
“By heaven! That’s cool.”
Hurstmanceaux, as he muttered the involuntary words, stared down on her too astonished to say more, too completely stupefied and taken aback to be aware of the indelicacy of his own astonishment.
“Have you any more suggestions to make?” she said with her utmost insolence.