“He is still in the sitting-room.”
“Why don’t you go to him?”
“I daren’t!”
“Shall I go?”
“Yes—and give him this.”
Mrs. Presty took the letter. “You mean, tear it up,” she said, “and quite right, too.”
“No; I mean what I say.”
“My dear child, if you have any regard for yourself, if you have any regard for me, don’t ask me to give Bennydeck this mad letter! You won’t hear reason? You still insist on it?”
“I do.”
“If Kitty ever behaves to you, Catherine, as you have behaved to me—you will have richly deserved it. Oh, if you were only a child again, I’d beat it out of you—I would!”