“Truly,” returned Mrs. Wilfer, courteously receiving the deserter, “it would seem that we are required to think so. And this, Lavinia, is my reason for objecting to a tone of levity. Mrs. Boffin (of whose physiognomy I can never speak with the composure I would desire to preserve), and your mother, are not on terms of intimacy. It is not for a moment to be supposed that she and her husband dare to presume to speak of this family as the Wilfers. I cannot therefore condescend to speak of them as the Boffins. No; for such a tone⁠—call it familiarity, levity, equality, or what you will⁠—would imply those social interchanges which do not exist. Do I render myself intelligible?”

Without taking the least notice of this inquiry, albeit delivered in an imposing and forensic manner, Lavinia reminded her sister, “After all, you know, Bella, you haven’t told us how your Whatshisnames are.”