"Well!--I wonder at it, is all I can say. They go so much by teeth. Besides, look at the way she hooks her dress. The whole thing! You may depend on it that Mr. Challis is only doing it for a blind, because Harmood's pretty...." "Doing what for a blind?" "Oh, my dear child, what a silly you are! You know perfectly well what I mean. That sort of thing. He wants you to think he hasn't any eyes, and makes believe to prefer the ugly one. Lots of husbands go on like that--only simpletons never see anything." "I can't see that it makes any difference to me, either way." "Very well, dear! Look at it your own way. Only don't blame me and say I didn't tell you!" Marianne wanted to say something sharp to her friend, but could not, owing to lack of constructive power in emergencies. However, as that lady closed with a snap, even as a moral physician who had written a prescription and done her duty, there was time to consider an extempore--an _ex multo tempore_, one might say. "I wish you would say exactly what you mean, Charlotte." "What about? About the servants?" "No. About Titus." "My dear Marianne, it isn't any use talking about it. A woman in your position has to expect it...." "Yes! But expect what?" "If you won't interrupt me, I'll tell you. Of course, you know I know perfectly well your husband is to be trusted, and all that sort of thing. He has too much genuine regard for you. But I always have thought, and always shall think, that men can't help themselves...." "What for? I mean, why do you go on raking up? Can't you leave alone?" "That's just what I was going to say, dear! Especially in this case. Because there's really no need, if you come to think of it. I'll tell you, dear, exactly what I should _recommend_ you to do--what _I_ should do if I were in your place. I should either say _absolutely nothing_, or if I said anything at all, just make it chaff--talk about his new flame--say you will evidently have to get somebody else, don't you see? As if it was entirely out of the question! Or perhaps that would be dangerous, and it wouldn't do to have him thinking you suspected him of fancying you weren't in earnest. No!--on the whole, I recommend saying _absolutely nothing_." Marianne's brain refuses to receive complications beyond a certain point. She picks up the last intelligible phrase. "As if _what_ was entirely out of the question?" But Mrs. Eldridge is on her guard against making mischief. "You mustn't run away with the idea that I said there _was_ anything," is the form her caution takes. And then, in response to an angry flush on her friend's face, "I'm sure there isn't the slightest reason for you to be uneasy. I have far too much faith in your husband to suppose such a thing possible for one moment.... No, indeed, dear!--even if she gets him to get her into this play of his--and then, of course, they would go on seeing each other--I shouldn't feel the smallest uneasiness. Because look at her social position!"