"Lady Margaret," at length he said, in a tone of greater sternness
than I thought him capable of using, "I have hitherto spoken to you as
a friend, but I have not forgotten that I am also your guardian, and
that my authority as such gives me a right to controul your conduct.
I shall put a question to you, and I expect and will demand a
plain, direct answer. Have I rightly been informed that you have
contemptuously rejected the suit and hand of my son Edward?"

I stammered forth with a good deal of trepidation:--

"I believe, that is, I have, sir, rejected my cousin's proposals; and
my coldness and discouragement might have convinced him that I had
determined to do so."

"Madame," replied he, with suppressed, but, as it appeared to me,
intense anger, "I have lived long enough to know that _coldness and
discouragement_, and such terms, form the common cant of a worthless
coquette. You know to the full, as well as I, that _coldness and
discouragement_ may be so exhibited as to convince their object that
he is neither distasteful nor indifferent to the person who wears that
manner. You know, too, none better, that an affected neglect, when
skillfully managed, is amongst the most formidable of the allurements
which artful beauty can employ. I tell you, madame, that having,
without one word spoken in discouragement, permitted my son's most
marked attentions for a twelvemonth or more, you have no _right_ to
dismiss him with no further explanation than demurely telling him that
you had always looked coldly upon him, and neither your wealth nor
_your ladyship_ (there was an emphasis of scorn on the word which
would have become Sir Giles Overreach himself) can warrant you in