PIKE. Yes, ma'am! Go on.
LADY CREECH [loftily]. She came to me something more than a year ago--
PIKE [simply]. Did you advertise?
LADY CREECH [stung]. I suppose it is your intention to be offensive.
PIKE [protesting]. No, ma'am; I didn't mean anything. But, you see,
I've handled all her accounts, and her payments to you--
LADY CREECH [crushingly]. We will omit tradesman-like references! What
Lord Hawcastle wished me to impress on you is not only that you will
ruin yourself, but put a blight upon the life of the young lady whom you
are pleased to consider your ward. We make this suggestion because we
conceive that you have a preposterous sentimental interest yourself in
Miss Granger-Simpson.
PIKE [taken aback]. Me?
LADY CREECH. Upon what other ground are we to explain your conduct?
PIKE. You mean that I'd only stand between her and you for my own sake?
LADY CREECH. We can comprehend no other grounds.
PIKE [solemnly]. I don't believe you can! But you _can_ comprehend that
I wouldn't have any hope, can't you?
LADY CREECH. One never knows what these weird Americans hope. Hawcastle
assures me you have some such idea, but my charge has studied under my
instruction--deportment, manners, and ideals--which has lifted her above
the mere American circumstance of her birth.
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