It was a slow method, but not without its advantages, I assure you.
Perhaps to relieve her worthy aunt of any lingering anxiousness, Beatrice, throughout the day, wore an appearance of much contentment, and to Wilfrid was especially condescending, even talking with him freely on a subject quite unconnected with her pet interests.

That evening two gentlemen, politicians, dined at the house; Beatrice, under cover of their loud discussions in the drawing-room, exchanged certain remarks with Wilfrid.
'My aunt was so good as to apologise to me on your behalf this morning,' she began.
'Apologise?
What have I been guilty of ?' 'Oh, nothing.

She doesn't appreciate the freemasonry between us.

It occurred to her that your remarks on my--well, my predilections, might have troubled me.

Judge how amused I was!' She did not look at him from the first, and appeared to be examining, even whilst she spoke, a book of prints.
'I sincerely hope,' Wilfrid replied, 'that I have uttered no thoughtless piece of rudeness.