That thought set her teeth on edge.

She did not doubt the sincerity of her antipathy to him even when she detected herself in the act of protesting inwardly that she was not glad to meet him again, and that she would not speak to him.

Gertrude, meanwhile, was giving short answers to Erskine and listening to Trefusis.

She had gathered from the domestic squabbles of the last few days that Lady Brandon, against her husband's will, had invited a notorious demagogue, the rich son of a successful cotton-spinner, to visit the Beeches.

She had made up her mind to snub any such man.