"He is courteous and forbearing, and does not think that everything around him should be suited to his own peculiar fancies." "I am glad that you are contented with the marriage, Mr. Wharton." "Who has said that I am contented with it? No one ought to understand or to share my discontent so cordially as yourself, Mrs. Fletcher;--and no one ought to be more chary of speaking of it. You and I had hoped other things, and old people do not like to be disappointed. But I needn't paint the devil blacker than he is." "I'm afraid that, as usual, he is rather black." "Mother," said John Fletcher, "the thing has been done and you might as well let it be. We are all sorry that Emily has not come nearer to us; but she has had a right to choose for herself, and I for one wish,--as does my brother also,--that she may be happy in the lot she has chosen." "His conduct to Arthur at Silverbridge was so nice!" said the pertinacious old woman. "Never mind his conduct, mother. What is it to us?" "That's all very well, John; but according to that nobody is to talk about anybody." "I would much prefer, at any rate," said Mr. Wharton, "that you would not talk about Mr. Lopez in my hearing." "Oh; if that is to be so, let it be so. And now I understand where I am." Then the old woman shook herself, and endeavoured to look as though Mr. Wharton's soreness on the subject were an injury to her as robbing her of a useful topic. "I don't like Lopez, you know," Mr. Wharton said to John Fletcher afterwards. "How would it be possible that I should like such a man? But there can be no good got by complaints. It is not what your mother suffers, or what even I may suffer,--or worse again, what Arthur may suffer, that makes the sadness of all this. What will be her life? That is the question. And it is too near me, too important to me, for the endurance either of scorn or pity. I was glad that you asked your mother to be silent." "I can understand it," said John. "I do not think that she will trouble you again."