He's merely an insolent boy. He thinks he can keep
you to your word by threats. He will be different when he
sees he has a man to deal with."
What follows should be prefaced with some simile--the
simile of a powder-mine, a thunderbolt, an earthquake--for it
blew Philip up in the air and flattened him on the ground
and swallowed him up in the depths. Lilia turned on her
gallant defender and said--
"For once in my life I'll thank you to leave me alone.
I'll thank your mother too. For twelve years you've trained
me and tortured me, and I'll stand it no more. Do you think
I'm a fool? Do you think I never felt? Ah! when I came to
your house a poor young bride, how you all looked me
over--never a kind word--and discussed me, and thought I might
just do; and your mother corrected me, and your sister
snubbed me, and you said funny things about me to show how
clever you were! And when Charles died I was still to run
in strings for the honour of your beastly family, and I was
to be cooped up at Sawston and learn to keep house, and all
my chances spoilt of marrying again. No, thank you! No,
thank you! 'Bully?' 'Insolent boy?' Who's that, pray, but
you? But, thank goodness, I can stand up against the world
now, for I've found Gino, and this time I marry for love!"
The coarseness and truth of her attack alike overwhelmed
him. But her supreme insolence found him words, and he too
burst forth.
"Yes! and I forbid you to do it! You despise me,
perhaps, and think I'm feeble.
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