Edgerton, walking his horse beside Diana's, suddenly drew bridle with an uncontrollable gesture of disgust.
"Listen to me," he said; "where man's despoiling labor pollutes nature, sadness and resignation make heavy the hearts of her true lovers, but where man's abominable ignorance desecrates, reigns a more shocking desolation which no modest heart ever forgives!"
Diana, surprised by the sudden and unexpected outburst, drew bridle beside his standing horse.
A moment previous they had been amiably exchanging idle gossip from their saddles, gradually falling back behind the others—Silvette, Christine, Jack, and Colonel Curmew—who had cantered on forward; and now, suddenly out of a clear sky, not apropos of anything, Edgerton had flashed out the bolt of his contempt for the House of Rivett—for his ox, his ass, his servants, and all that was Rivett's.
"Jim," she remarked, "isn't it rather bad taste of you to say that?"
"Why? I am paid for being here." But he realized that she was right, and it made him sullen.
"His roof shelters you none the less," she said quietly.
"Yours is rather a fine-drawn sense of hospitality, it seems to me," he retorted.
"I can't snap at the hand that feeds me."
"Good Lord! May a man not have his own ideas?"