How she must have hated them! But I conclude she would have carried out whatever plan she might have formed.

I can imagine de Barral accustomed for years to defer to her wishes and, either through arrogance, or shyness, or simply because of his unimaginative stupidity, remaining outside the social pale, knowing no one but some card-playing cronies; I can picture him to myself terrified at the prospect of having the care of a marriageable girl thrust on his hands, forcing on him a complete change of habits and the necessity of another kind of existence which he would not even have known how to begin.

It is evident to me that Mrs.What's her name would have had her atrocious way with very little trouble even if the excellent Fynes had been able to do something.

She would simply have bullied de Barral in a lofty style.

There's nothing more subservient than an arrogant man when his arrogance has once been broken in some particular instance.
However there was no time and no necessity for any one to do anything.
The situation itself vanished in the financial crash as a building vanishes in an earthquake--here one moment and gone the next with only an ill-omened, slight, preliminary rumble.