"But if one can afford a romance? What's the use of being rich?"
"No, no, it's the poor people who can go in for romance. They've nothing to lose! Divide nothing a year between two--or, presently, four--and still it's no less."
"But the rich have nothing to gain--except romance."
"Oh, yes, sometimes. At the time of the Coronation I had quite a quarrel with Jack because he wasn't a peer. He said I ought to have thought of it before, but I said that that would have been quite disloyal." She lowered her voice to a discreet whisper. "I do hope she's not distressed about this morning?"
"A little, I'm afraid. Octon had his interesting side for her."
"I'm so sorry! I must be very nice to her after dinner."
Lady Aspenick was very "nice" to Jenny after dinner, and so were all of them. She seemed to take new rank that evening--to undergo a kind of informal but very real adoption into the inner circle of families which made the local society. She was no longer a stranger entertaining them; she had become one of themselves. This could not all be reward for ostracizing Octon. Lady Aspenick's conversation, in itself not remarkable for depth or originality, was a surface sign of another current of opinion bearing strongly on Jenny's position. But no doubt acquiescence in the ostracism was a condition precedent both to the adoption and to that remoter prospect which inspired it.
Jenny's eyes were very clear. After they had all gone, I returned to the drawing-room to bid her good night. Chat had already scuttled off to bed--dinner parties kept her up later than was to her liking. Jenny was leaning her elbow on the mantelpiece.
"Well," she said, "I've been good--and I've had my sugar-plums."
"Yes, and they've got plenty more for you if you go on being good."
"Oh, yes." Her voice sounded tired, and her face looked strained.
Up to now she had shown no sign of resenting the pressure put upon her; she had been sorrowful, but had displayed no anger. She did not even now challenge the justice of Fillingford's decision; but she broke out into a rage against the control claimed over herself.
"They force me to things," she said in a low voice, but in a tone full of feeling. "They tell me I must do this or do that, or else I can't be one of them, I can't rank with them, I can't, I suppose, marry Lord Fillingford! Well, I yield where I must, but sometimes I get my own way all the same. Let them look out for that! Yes, I get my own way in the end, Austin."