Mrs. Boyce looked up more gravely.

“You misunderstand me, my dear,” she said quietly.  “I allow myself to wonder at you a little, but I think no hard things of you ever.  I believe you like Aldous.”

“Really, mamma!” cried Marcella, half hysterically.

Mrs. Boyce had by now rolled up her work and shut her workbasket.

“If you are going to take off your things,” she said, “please tell William that there will be six or seven at tea.  You said, I think, that Mr. Raeburn was going to bring Mr. Hallin?”

“Yes, and Frank Leven is coming.  When will Mr. Wharton be here?”

“Oh, in ten minutes or so, if his train is punctual.  I hear your father just coming in.”

Marcella went away, and Mrs. Boyce was left a few minutes alone.  Her thin hands lay idle a moment on her lap, and leaning towards the window beside her, she looked out an instant into the snowy twilight.  Her mind was full of its usual calm scorn for those—­her daughter included—­who supposed that the human lot was to be mended by a rise in weekly wages, or that suffering has any necessary dependence on the amount of commodities of which a man disposes.  What hardship is there in starving and scrubbing and toiling?  Had she ever seen a labourer’s wife scrubbing her cottage floor without envy, without moral thirst?  Is it these things that kill, or any of the great simple griefs and burdens?  Doth man live by bread alone?  The whole language of social and charitable enthusiasm often raised in her a kind of exasperation.

So Marcella would be rich, excessively rich, even now.  Outside the amount settled upon her, the figures of Aldous Raeburn’s present income, irrespective of the inheritance which would come to him on his grandfather’s death, were a good deal beyond what even Mr. Boyce—­upon whom the daily spectacle of the Maxwell wealth exercised a certain angering effect—­had supposed.

Mrs. Boyce had received the news of the engagement with astonishment, but her after-acceptance of the situation had been marked by all her usual philosophy.  Probably behind the philosophy there was much secret relief.  Marcella was provided for.  Not the fondest or most contriving mother could have done more for her than she had at one stroke done for herself.  During the early autumn Mrs. Boyce had experienced some moments of sharp prevision as to what her future relations might be towards this strong and restless daughter, so determined to conquer a world her mother had renounced.  Now all was clear, and a very shrewd observer could allow her mind to play freely with the ironies of the situation.