"They are not likely to suppose that. But really, Julia, you were for a while all smiles and encouragement. Tell me, now, did Mr. Hattersley propose to you?"
"Well—yes, he did, and I refused him."
"And then he went and shot himself in despair. Julia, you cannot with any face go to the ball."
"Nobody knows that he proposed. And precisely because I do go everyone will conclude that he did not propose. I do not wish it to be supposed that he did."
"His family, of course, must have been aware. They will see your name among those present at the assembly."
"Aunt, they are in too great trouble to look at the paper to see who were at the dance."
"His terrible death lies at your door. How you can have the heart, Julia——"
"I don't see it. Of course, I feel it. I am awfully sorry, and awfully sorry for his father, the admiral. I cannot set him up again. I wish that when I rejected him he had gone and done as did Joe Pomeroy, marry one of his landlady's daughters."
"There, Julia, is another of your delinquencies. You lured on young Pomeroy till he proposed, then you refused him, and in a fit of vexation and mortified vanity he married a girl greatly beneath him in social position. If the ménage prove a failure you will have it on your conscience that you have wrecked his life and perhaps hers as well."
"I cannot throw myself away as a charity to save this man or that from doing a foolish thing."