Part 6 (1/2)

_Dolly._ No, dear. Who is it? Do I know him?

_Renie._ Your cousin Lucas has a deep and sincere admiration for me.

_Dolly._ Lu!? Lu!? Of course! I might have known he'd never ride a dozen miles in the snow for a sermon! It's disgraceful of him!

_Renie._ No, dear, he's not to blame. We are neither of us to blame.

_Dolly._ [_Contemptuously._] Oh! Why you haven't known him a month, have you?

_Renie._ I met him for the first time in this room three weeks ago last Thursday afternoon.

_Dolly._ It's a great pity the Professor didn't come down with you.

_Renie._ That would have made no difference. It had to be!

_Dolly._ What had to be? Renie, how far has this gone? You've been meeting him alone----

_Renie._ Once or twice.

_Dolly._ You've slipped away every afternoon this week.

_Renie._ However often I may have met him, he has offered me nothing but the most chivalrous attention. He has always respected me----

_Dolly._ Well then, he mustn't respect you any more. It must be stopped.

_Renie._ Dolly, I didn't expect you to take up this att.i.tude.

_Dolly._ You don't suppose I'm going to have this sort of thing in my own house, do you?

_Renie._ What sort of thing?

_Dolly._ Do you remember the awful row I got into at school when your boy's love letter was discovered in the Banbury cakes you'd persuaded me to take in for you?

_Renie._ But you received Banbury cakes of your own!

_Dolly._ Not since I've been married. Of course before your marriage your outrageous flirting didn't much matter----

_Renie._ Outrageous flirting?--If I seemed to flirt----

_Dolly._ Seemed?!

_Renie._ It was only in the vain hope of meeting with one who could offer me the perfect homage that I have always felt would one day be mine.

_Dolly._ Well, he mustn't offer it here! I shall tell him so very plainly. He'd better not stay to dinner.

_Renie._ There is no reason Captain Wentworth should not stay to dinner.

He has given me the one absolutely blameless unselfish devotion of his life. I've accepted it on that distinct understanding. I've trusted you with my secret, a secret honourable alike to Captain Wentworth and myself. You've promised not to breathe a word to any living soul. You surely don't mean to break your word?

_Dolly._ I don't mean to stand the racket of your Banbury cakes.