She saw what he was aiming at, and felt not at all disposed to pleasure him.
There was a long silence; Alice was determined not to be the first to break it.
'You refuse to help me ?' Richard asked at length, between his teeth.
'I think it would be every bit as bad for me as for you,' she replied.
'That you can't think,' he argued.

'She can't blame you; you've only to say I've behaved like a blackguard, and you're out of it.' 'And when do you mean to tell mother ?' 'She'll have to hear of it from other people.

I can't tell her.' Richard had a suspicion that he was irretrievably ruining himself in his sister's opinion, and it did not improve his temper.

It was a foretaste of the wider obloquy to come upon him, possibly as hard to bear as any condemnation to which he had exposed himself.

He shook himself out of the chair.
'Well, that's all I've got to tell you.