Miss Ley then gave her account of the visit to Rochester, and certainly made of it a very neat and entertaining story.
“And did you think for a moment that this would be the end of the business?” asked Frank, ironically.
“Don’t be spiteful because I hoped for the best.”
“Dear Miss Ley, the bigger blackguard a man is, the more devoted are his lady-loves. It’s only when a man is decent and treats women as if they were human beings that he has a rough time of it.”
“You know nothing about these things, Frank,” retorted Miss Ley. “Pray give me the facts, and the philosophical conclusions I can draw for myself.”
“Well, Reggie has a natural aptitude for dealing with the sex. I heard all about your excursion to Rochester, and went so far as to assure him that you wouldn’t tell his mamma. He perceived that he hadn’t cut a very heroic figure, so he mounted the high horse, and full of virtuous indignation, for a month took no notice whatever of Mrs. Castillyon. Then she wrote most humbly begging him to forgive her; and this, I understand, he graciously did. He came to see me, flung the letter on the table, and said: ‘There, my boy, if anyone asks you, say that what I don’t know about women ain’t worth knowing.’ Two days later he appeared with a gold cigarette-case!”
“What did you say to him?”
“‘One of these days you’ll come the very devil of a cropper.’”
“You showed wisdom and emphasis. I hope with all my heart he will.”
“I don’t imagine things are going very smoothly,” proceeded Frank. “Reggie tells me she leads him a deuce of a life, and he’s growing restive. It appears to be no joke to have a woman desperately in love with you. And then he’s never been on such familiar terms with a person of quality, and he’s shocked by her vulgarity. Her behaviour seems often to outrage his sense of decorum.”