He
had gone flagrantly over to the Bohemian set.
I could detect that his eyes were still glassy, but his head was
erect. He seemed to flaunt his shame. And the guilty partner of his
downfall drove with an affectation of easy carelessness, yet with a
lift of the chin which, though barely perceptible, had all the effect
of binding the prisoner to her chariot wheels; a prisoner, moreover,
whom it was plain she meant to parade to the last ignominious degree.
She drove leisurely, and in the little infrequent curt turns of her
head to address her companion she contrived to instill so finished an
effect of boredom that she must have goaded to frenzy any matron of
the North Side set who chanced to observe her, as more than one of
them did.
Thrice did she halt along our main thoroughfare for bits of shopping,
a mere running into of shops or to the doors of them where she could
issue verbal orders, the while she surveyed her waiting and drugged
captive with a certain half-veiled but good-humoured insolence. At
these moments--for I took pains to overlook the shocking scene--the
Honourable George followed her with eyes no longer glassed; the eyes
of helpless infatuation. "He looks at her," Cousin Egbert had said. He
had told it all and told it well.
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