What was she to say to such a mother? How could she hope for sympathy from such a source? How could she tell Lady Gwendolen that she had changed her mind--that she loved not Ernest Clifton but Pierce Winwood?
That was the terrible part of this greeting of her parents: they took everything for granted; they assumed that her dearest wish was to obtain their consent to be engaged with Mr. Clifton, though it did not look very much as if they expected her to be exuberant in her gratitude to them for their complaisance. She had been deadly cold while her father had spoken to her, and she had not warmed in the least under the influence of her mother's chatter. Was this the way in which girls as a rule deport themselves when the happiest hour of their life has come?
"I am not going out this afternoon," she said when her mother had turned to a mirror to pinch some fancied improvement in the poppies that flared over her _tocque_.
"What nonsense are you talking?" cried Lady Gwen pinching away. "What nonsense! These things should be bordered with wire; they fall out of shape in a day. Is that an improvement?"
"I somehow think that it was best lying flat. No, I'm not going out this afternoon. I am deadly tired."
"You do look a bit blowsy," said the mother with a critical poise of the inverted flower-basket on her head. Then, as if a sudden thought had struck her, she added, while Josephine was going to the door: "Don't you run away with the notion that he is likely to drop in this afternoon upon you. The chances are that he will be at the Oppenkirks', so your best chance will be to come with me."
"I have no wish to see anybody this evening--least of all Mr. Clifton. I'm only tired to death," said Josephine.
Her mother's laugh followed her to the staircase.
She threw herself upon the sofa in her boudoir and tried to face the situation which presented itself to her. She tried to think what she could do to escape from the toils which had been woven round her--woven with the appropriate phrases that went to the declaring of a father's blessing, and the frivolous inconsequence of a mother's acquiescence.
She felt for a moment as if she were a prisoner in a strong room, with bars across the windows and bolts upon the door. She looked, as an imprisoned girl might, first to the door then to the windows, as if she had a hope that, by some accidental neglect of precaution on the part of her gaoler a chance might be left for her of escape one way or another.