"If I was going to be anybody's sister Emily," said Betty, excited a
little by the sense of the fray, "I shouldn't want to be yours."
"Now Betty, don't be hateful," interposed Rosalie, laughing, and her
laugh was nervous. "There's Mina Thalberg coming up the front steps. Go
and meet her."
Rosalie, poor girl, always found herself nervous when Sir Nigel and
Betty were in the room together. She instinctively recognised their
antagonism and was afraid Betty would do something an English baronet
would think vulgar. Her simple brain could not have explained to her
why it was that she knew Sir Nigel often thought New Yorkers vulgar. She
was, however, quite aware of this but imperfectly concealed fact, and
felt a timid desire to be explanatory.
When Bettina marched out of the room with her extraordinary carriage
finely manifest, Rosy's little laugh was propitiatory.
"You mustn't mind her," she said. "She's a real splendid little thing,
but she's got a quick temper. It's all over in a minute."
"They wouldn't stand that sort of thing in England," said Sir Nigel.
"She's deucedly spoiled, you know."
He detested the child. He disliked all children, but this one awakened
in him more than mere dislike.
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