Well--eh!--what ?'--the speaker wound up impatiently, as though waiting for an immediate and applauding response.
Elizabeth was silent.

She bent over the Greek book in front of her, as though looking for her place.
'You didn't think I was going to take it lying down!' asked the Squire, in a raised voice.

Her silence suggested to him afresh all the odious and tyrannical forces by which he felt himself surrounded.
Elizabeth turned to him with a cheerful countenance.
'I don't quite understand what "it" means,' she said politely.
'Nonsense, you do!' was the angry reply.

'That's so like a woman.
They always want to catch you out; they never see things simply and broadly.

You'd like to make yourself out a fool--[Greek: nepia]--and you're not a fool!' And with his hands in his pockets he made two or three long strides up to the Nike, at the further end of the room, and back, pulling up beside her again, as though challenging her reply.
'I assure you, sir, I wasn't trying to catch you out,' Elizabeth began in her gentlest voice.
'Don't call me "sir." I won't have it!' cried the Squire, almost stamping.
Then Elizabeth laughed outright.
'I'm sorry, but when I was working in the War Trade Department I always called the head of my room "sir."' 'That's because women _like_ kow-towing--[Greek: doulosunen anechesthai]!' said the Squire.