“What is insufferable?”
It was Uncle John’s turn to assume an exterior calmness.
“Your unwarrantable interference in our family concerns! It has come to a pretty pass when I cannot even buy a beefsteak, or turn off a disorderly domestic, but you must interfere in the matter and volunteer an ignorant condemnation. To tell you the plain truth, Uncle John, I am getting very tired of this, and wish it to end. I didn’t consult you about this affair, because I didn’t think it one in which you had any rights or interest.”
“Indeed! You ignore my interests quite summarily. Pray, did you consult your husband?” inquired Mr. Fleetwood.
“No, I did not!” was replied. “There was no occasion to worry his mind on the subject.”
“Probably you thought he had no more right in the case than your troublesome old uncle,” said Mr. Fleetwood, sarcastically.
“Whether he had or not doesn’t signify in the present controversy,” replied Mrs. Dainty, still showing a great deal of angry excitement. “I chose to send away an offensive, upstart American girl, who didn’t know her place, and who kept the children by the ears half of the time, and take in her stead an accomplished, middle-aged lady, with years and experience on her side. I have no question in regard to my husband’s acquiescence, and therefore shall not permit you to hector me on the subject. So pray, Uncle John, spare me any further annoyance! It will only tend to produce, in both of us, states of unkindness.”
“Where so much is at stake, I must venture much,” said Mr. Fleetwood. “I pray you, in turn, be not offended, if I press you on this subject. The love I bear for you and these children will not let me keep silence. You have strangely misapprehended Florence Harper. She——”
“Uncle John!” Mrs. Dainty interrupted the old gentleman, “I have shut the door against her: so let her name die in this house. I shall not consent to canvass with you either her good or evil qualities. I know just as much of her as I ever care to know.”
“What do you know of this Mrs. Jeckyl, to whom, in such mad haste, you have given over the care of your children? An accomplished English lady? Is that the extent of your knowledge? Did you ever hear of her before to-day?”