“Indeed they did—all the three first rows, and the choir boys. It’s so bad for them. If I’d been in your place he shouldn’t have read another word.”
“My dear, I assure you it wasn’t such a scandal as you think—certainly not enough to justify a breach with my father.”
“That’s just it—you’re afraid of him, and I want you to stand your ground this time. It’s not right that we should be looked down upon the way we are, but we always will be if you won’t stick up for yourself—and I really fail to see why you should countenance immorality just to please your father.”
Perhaps it was owing to this conversation with his wife that during most of the conference George sat dumb. As a matter of fact, nobody talked much, except Sir John and Mary. Mary had a queer, desperate volubility about her—she who was so aloof had now become familiar, to defend her aloofness. Her whole nature shrank from the exposure of the divorce court.
“But what have you got to expose?” cried Sir John when she used this expression, “you tell me you’ve done nothing.”
“I’ve loved Julian, and he’s killed my love for him—I don’t want that shown up before everybody.”
“It won’t be—it doesn’t concern the case.”
“Oh, yes, it does—that sort of thing always comes out—‘the parties were married in 1912 and lived happily together till 1919, when the respondent left the petitioner without any explanation’—it’ll be all to Julian’s interest to show that he made me an excellent husband and that I loved him devotedly till Something—which means Somebody—came between us.”
“He’ll do that if you don’t defend the case.”
“But it won’t be dwelt on—pored over—it won’t provide copy for the newspapers. Oh, can’t anybody see that when a woman makes a mistake like mine she doesn’t want it read about at the breakfast tables of thousands of—of——”