I can say this, for I was acutely critical of their bearing; the atmosphere of the place was never perfectly pleasing to me.
My attitude of watchful reserve, and my reputation as the heir of immense wealth, tended possibly to constrain a certain number of the inimical party to be ostensibly civil.

Lady Wilts, who did me the honour to patronize me almost warmly, complimented me on my manner of backing him, as if I were the hero; but I felt his peculiar charm; she partly admitted it, making a whimsical mouth, saying, in allusion to Miss Penrhys, 'I, you know, am past twenty.

At twenty forty is charming; at forty twenty.' Where I served him perhaps was in showing my resolution to protect him: he had been insulted before my arrival.

The male relatives of Miss Penrhys did not repeat the insult; they went to Lady Wilts and groaned over their hard luck in not having the option of fighting me.

I was, in her phrase, a new piece on the board, and checked them.