"That's where I'm cleverer than you," said his wife. "I've not only thought about next autumn, but about next week, and about next year, and the year after that, and the year after that, too. Listen, old thing. When you first met me you wanted to put me in a little flat round the corner, didn't you? Please don't interrupt me. You couldn't understand then why I wouldn't accept your offer; I don't think you really understand very much better even now. London for me doesn't exist any longer. How you can possibly expect me to go away from this glorious place, which I already love as if I'd lived here all my life, to tear about the Continent with you as if I wasn't your wife at all, I don't know. If you don't realize what you owe to your name, I realize it. I don't choose that people should say: 'There goes that ass Clarehaven who married a girl from the Vanity. Look at him!' I don't choose that people should point you out as my husband. I choose to be your wife, and I intend that all your family--and when I say your family I mean your mother's family, too--shall go down on their knees and thank God that you did marry a Vanity girl, and that a Vanity girl knew what she owed to her country in these dreadful days when common Radicals are trying to destroy all that we hold most sacred. I want you to take your place in the House of Lords, when you've lost that trick of talking to everybody as if they were waiters at the Savoy. Why, you don't deserve to be an earl!" "My dear thing, you mustn't attach too much importance to a title. You must remember...." "Are you trying to correct my tone?" she asked, coldly. "Because, let me tell you that all this false modesty about your position is only snobbery dressed out in a new disguise. Anyway, I didn't marry you to be criticized." "Oh well, of course, if you insist on staying down here for the present I suppose I must," said Tony. "Anyway, I dare say we can have some jolly parties to cheer the place up a bit." "No, we sha'n't have any jolly parties--at any rate yet awhile," said Dorothy. "I don't intend to begin by turning Clare gardens into bear gardens." "Good Heavens! what is the matter with you?" he demanded. "What has my mother been saying?" "Your mother hasn't been saying anything. I said all these things over to myself a thousand thousand times before I married you." "Well, why didn't you tell me some of your ideas before you did marry me?" he muttered. "Do you regret it?" she asked, standing up. "Don't be a silly old thing, Doodles. Of course I don't regret it. But having married the loveliest girl in London, I should like to splash around a bit with you. My tastes are bonhomous. I'd always thought.... Dash it, I love you madly, you know that. I'm proud of you." "Aren't you proud that the loveliest girl in London is willing to be loved by you only? God! my dear boy, you ought to be grateful that you've got me to yourself."