ever saw me again: and unless I said something almost as unpleasant back again? Would anything else be natural?”
“Oh yes!” said Hilda. “Just good manners would be quite natural.”
“Second nature, so to speak!” he said: then he began to laugh. “Nay,” he said. “I’m weary o’ manners. Let me be!”
Hilda was frankly baffled and furiously annoyed. After all, he might show that he realized he was being honoured. Instead of which, with his playacting and lordly airs, he seemed to think it was he who was conferring the honour. Just impudence! Poor misguided Connie, in the man’s clutches!
The three ate in silence. Hilda looked to see what his table manners were like. She could not help realizing that he was instinctively much more delicate and well-bred than herself. She had a certain Scottish clumsiness. And moreover, he had all the quiet self-contained assurance of the English, no loose edges. It would be very difficult to get the better of him.