Iris bridled a little.

“I’m sure I wasn’t shrill.  I spoke in a very ordinary voice.  And I don’t know why you should attribute such thoughts to me.”

Lashmar gave way to nervous irritation.

“What a feminine way of talking!  Is it impossible for you to follow a logical train of ideas?  I attributed no thought whatever to you.  All I said was, that I must take care not to be misunderstood.  And I see that I had very good reason; you have a fatal facility in misconceiving even the simplest things.”

Mrs. Woolstan bridled still more.  There was a point of colour on her freckled cheeks, her lower lip showed a tooth’s pressure.

“After all,” she said, “you must remember that I am a woman, and if women don’t express themselves quite as men do, I see no great harm in it.  I don’t think mannishness is a very nice quality.  After all, I am myself, and I can’t become somebody else, and certainly shouldn’t care to, if I could.”

Dyce began to laugh forbearingly.

“Come, come,” he said, “what’s all this wrangling about?  Row did it begin?  That’s the extraordinary thing with women; one gets so easily off the track, and runs one doesn’t know where.  What was I saying?  Oh, simply that I couldn’t be sure, yet, whether Hollingford would suit me.  Let us keep to the higher plane.  It’s safer than too familiar detail.”

Iris was not to be so easily composed.  She remarked a change in her friend since he had ceased to be Leonard’s tutor; he seemed to hold her in slighter esteem, a result, no doubt, of the larger prospects opening before him.  She was jealous of old Lady Ogram, whose place and wealth gave her such power to shape a man’s fortunes.  For some time now, Iris had imagined herself an influence in Lashmar’s life, had dreamed that her influence might prevail over all other.  In marrying, she had sacrificed herself to an illusory hope; but she was now an experienced woman, able to distinguish the phantasmal from the genuine, and of Lashmar’s powers there could be no doubt.  Her own judgment she saw confirmed by that of Lady Ogram.  Sharp would be her pang if the aspiring genius left her aside, passed beyond her with a careless nod.  She half accused him of ingratitude.

“I’m not at all sure,” she said, rather coldly, “that you think me capable of rising to the higher plane.  Perhaps trivial details are more suited to my intelligence.”

Dyce had relieved himself of a slight splenetic oppression, and felt that he was behaving boorishly.  He brightened and grew cordial, admitted a superfluous sensitiveness, assured his companion that he prized her sympathy, counted seriously upon her advice; in short, was as amiable as he knew how to be.  Under his soothing talk, Mrs. Woolstan recovered herself; but she had a preoccupied air.

“If you regard me as a serious friend,” she said at length with some embarrassment, “you can easily prove it, and put my mind at ease.”