I usen't to mind before I was rich, and father and Felicity and you and I
had a good time together. But when you're rich and among rich people, and
have a good time not because you make it for yourself out of all the
common things that everyone shares--the sunshine and the river and the
nice things in the streets--but have a special corner of good things
marked off for you, then it gets dreadful. 'Tisn't that one thinks one
ought to be doing more for other people; I don't think I've that sort of
conscience much; only that _I don't belong_. I can't help thinking of all
the down-below people, the disreputable, unlucky people, who fail and
don't get things, and I know that's where I really belong. It's like
being born in one family and going and living in another. You never fit
in really; your proper family is calling out to you all the time. Oh, not
only because they aren't rich and lucky, but because they really suit you
best, in little ways as well as big ways. You understand them, and they
understand you. All the butlers and footmen and lady's-maids frighten me
so; I don't like telling them to do things; they're so--so solemn and
respectable. And I don't like creatures to be killed, and I don't like
eating them afterwards. But Denis and his friends and the servants and
everyone thinks it's idiotic to be a vegetarian. Denis says vegetarians
are nearly all cranks and bounders, and long-haired men or short-haired
women. Well, I can't help it; I s'pose that shows where I really and
truly belong, though I don't like short-haired women; it's so ugly, and
they talk so loud very often. And there it is again; I dislike short hair
'cause of that, but Denis dislikes it 'cause _it isn't done_. That's so
often his reason; and he means not done by his partic'lar lot of top-room
people.... So you see, Peter, I don't belong there, do I? I don't belong
any more than you do."

Peter shook his head. "I never supposed you did, of course."