'Wednesday is my wedding day.'
'I am not interested in that event, Elsie. After your wedding with such a man, against the opinions, the wishes, the commands of all whom you are bound to respect, I can only say that you are no longer my daughter.'
'Oh! How can you be so fixed in such a belief? Mother, let me make one more appeal to your better feelings. Throw off these suspicions. Believe me, they are baseless. There is not the shadow of a foundation for this ridiculous structure they have raised. Consider. It is now—how long?—three weeks since they brought this charge, and they have proved nothing—absolutely nothing. If you would only be brought to see on what false assumptions the whole thing rests.'
'On solid foundations—hard facts—I want no more.'
'If I could prove to you that Athelstan was in America until a month ago.'
'Unhappy girl! He is deceiving you. He has been living for eight years in profligacy near London. Elsie, do not waste my time. It should be enough for me that my son-in-law, Sir Samuel Dering, a man of the clearest head and widest experience, is convinced that it is impossible to draw any other conclusions.'
'It is enough for me,' Elsie rejoined quickly, 'that my heart tells me that my brother and my lover cannot be such creatures.'
'You have something more to say, I suppose.' Mrs. Arundel buttoned her gloves. The clock was now at five minutes before eleven.
'Yes. If it is no use at all trying to appeal to——'
'No use at all,' Mrs. Arundel snapped. 'I am not disposed for sentimental nonsense.'