'My dear Aminta, whenever I go into society, and he is present, I know I
shall not be laughed at, or fall into that pit of one of their dead
silences, worse for me to bear than titters and faces. It is their way
of letting one feel they are of birth above us. Mr. Morsfield--purer
blood than many of their highest titles--is always polite, always
deferential; he helps me to feel I am not quite out of my element in the
sphere I prefer. We shall be travelling alone?'

'Have you any fear?'

'Not if nothing happens. Might we not ask that Mr. Weyburn?'

'He has much work to do. He will not long be here. He is absent
to-day.'

Mrs. Pagnell remarked: 'I must say he earns his money easily.'

Aminta had softened herself with the allusion to the shortness of his
time with them. Her aunt's coarse hint, and the thought of his loss,
and the banishment it would be to her all the way to Steignton, checked
a sharp retort she could have uttered, but made it necessary to hide her
eyes from sight. She went to her bedroom, and flung herself on the bed.
Even so little as an unspoken defence of him shook her to floods of
tears.




CHAPTER XVI