He always spoilt Angela a little, and she sprang to him with a kind
of droll pout. 'You'll not be cross, Edgar. You'll let us hear
Alice's transmigrations. Look! here's Felix bottled them up in an
envelope, and won't let us peep at them! But you'll let me hear. You
won't order me off to bed.'
Cherry fancied she saw a disconcerted look on his face when he saw
the envelope held up to him; but if so, it instantly gave place to
the mischievous entertainment of defeating a lesson on discretion.--
'The heads of the family must assert themselves sometimes, my dear,
even about nothing,' he said consolingly.
'Indeed,' said Wilmet, bristling in defence of Felix, 'of course we
knew it was nothing. It was only very ill-mannered and wrong of
Angela to go prying into what was not meant to be shown.
'I'm sure,' said Edgar most ungratefully, 'it might be posted on the
church door for what I care, except for its intrinsic vileness.'
'Oh, let's have it! let's have it!' burst out Lance and Robina, who
had been burning with curiosity all the time.
'Don't let us have them murdered, whatever they are,' said Edgar,
taking them into his own hand. 'Pity the sorrows of a poor wretch
seduced into one of your horrid jeux d'esprit--a lady's excuse for
fishing for compliments that sound more than they mean.
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