They would not even acknowledge her cleverness, not even Wollaston Lee, for whom Maria entertained a rudimentary affection.

He was even rude to her.
"Maria Edgham is awful stuck up," he told his mother.

He was of that age when a boy tells his mother a good deal, and he was an only child.
"She's a real pretty little girl, and her aunt says she is a good girl," replied his mother, who regarded the whole as the antics of infancy.
The Lees lived near the Edghams, on the same street, and Mrs.Lee and Aunt Maria had exchanged several calls.

They were, in fact, almost intimate.

The Lees were at the supper-table when Wollaston made his deprecatory remark concerning Maria, and he had been led to do so by the law of sequence.