Mrs.Boyce, however, wore her clothes so daintily, and took such scrupulous and ingenious care of them, that her dress cost, in truth, extremely little--certainly less than Marcella's.
There were sounds first of footsteps in the hall, then of some scolding of William, and finally Mr.Boyce entered, tired and splashed from shooting, and evidently in a bad temper.
"Well, what are you going to do about those cards ?" he asked his wife abruptly when she had supplied him with tea, and he was beginning to dry by the fire.

He was feeling ill and reckless; too tired anyway to trouble himself to keep up appearances with Marcella.
"Return them," said Mrs.Boyce, calmly, blowing out the flame of her silver kettle.
"_I_ don't want any of their precious society," he said irritably.

"They should have done their calling long ago.

There's no grace in it now; I don't know that one isn't inclined to think it an intrusion." But the women were silent.

Marcella's attention was diverted from her mother to the father's small dark head and thin face.