“You see, Charlotte, your kindness⁠—I shall never forget it. But⁠—as you said⁠—it is my affair. Mine and his.”

“And you are going to implore him, to beg him to keep silence?”

“Certainly not. There would be no difficulty. Whatever you ask him he answers, yes or no; then it is over. I have been frightened of him. But now I am not one little bit.”

“But we fear him for you, dear. You are so young and inexperienced, you have lived among such nice people, that you cannot realize what men can be⁠—how they can take a brutal pleasure in insulting a woman whom her sex does not protect and rally round. This afternoon, for example, if I had not arrived, what would have happened?”

“I can’t think,” said Lucy gravely.