“Theodore, are we to have no dinner?” cried Lady Sophia, when Ponsonby was gone.
“Dinner, dinner!” exclaimed Canon Spratte, scornfully. “How can I think of dinner now, Sophia? I have a duty to perform. You forgot that my position is radically altered.”
“I knew you’d remind us of it in less than five minutes,” said Lady Sophia, who felt that firmness now was needed or the future would be unbearable.
“I and my family have always been in the vanguard of progress,” replied the bishop elect, with a glance at the Lord Chancellor’s portrait.
“I know, but even your family wants its dinner sometimes.”
“Sophia, I shall be obliged if you will not interrupt me. I cannot say I think it kind of you to insist in this vulgar way on the satisfaction of a gross and sensual appetite. I should have thought on such an occasion worthier thoughts would occupy your mind. But if your flesh is weak I am willing that you should begin. I am not a selfish man, and Heaven forbid that I should ask as a right what an affectionate and Christian disposition should grant as a pleasure.”
“Fiddlesticks!”
Canon Spratte looked his sister up and down. He held himself very erect.
“Sophia, I have long felt that you do not treat me with the respect I venture to consider my due. I must really beg you not to act towards me any longer with this mixture of indecent frivolity and vulgar cynicism. I do not wish to remind you that there is a change in my position.”
“You have done so twice in five minutes,” said Lady Sophia, acidly.