As soon as the fact was publicly announced, some of Mrs.Elmslie's more intimate friends, who were acquainted with the reports affecting the Monkton family, ventured to mingle with their formal congratulations one or two significant references to the late Mrs.Monkton and some searching inquiries as to the disposition of her son.
Mrs.Elmslie always met these polite hints with one bold form of answer.
She first admitted the existence of these reports about the Monktons which her friends were unwilling to specify distinctly, and then declared that they were infamous calumnies.

The hereditary taint had died out of the family generations back.

Alfred was the best, the kindest, the sanest of human beings.

He loved study and retirement; Ada sympathized with his tastes, and had made her choice unbiased; if any more hints were dropped about sacrificing her by her marriage, those hints would be viewed as so many insults to her mother, whose affection for her it was monstrous to call in question.

This way of talking silenced people, but did not convince them.