"I know what Mrs. Brigstock herself told me."
"You never in your life took her word for any other matter."
"Then won't yours do?" Mrs. Gereth demanded. "Haven't I had it from your
own mouth that he cares for you?"
Fleda turned pale, but she faced her companion and smiled. "You
confound, Mrs. Gereth, you mix things up. You've only had it from my own
mouth that I care for _him_!"
It was doubtless in contradictious allusion to this (which at the time
had made her simply drop her head as in a strange, vain reverie) that
Mrs. Gereth, a day or two later, said to Fleda: "Don't think I shall be
a bit affected if I'm here to see it when he comes again to make up to
you."
"He won't do that," the girl replied. Then she added, smiling: "But if
he should be guilty of such bad taste, it wouldn't be nice of you not to
be disgusted."
"I'm not talking of disgust; I'm talking of its opposite," said Mrs.
Gereth.
"Of its opposite?"
"Why, of any reviving pleasure that one might feel in such an
exhibition. I shall feel none at all. You may personally take it as you
like; but what conceivable good will it do?"