Chapter 81

He did not like Lord and Lady O.’s Alice; he almost hated her. He hated her for being so exactly what she ought to have been. Familiar with the family joke of Miss Wace’s habit of neat labels, he lacerated himself by labelling her as Miss Wace would have labelled. “The Perfect Wife,” he said; “Eminently Suitable.” There was no denying that Alice was very suitable indeed; she had a profound understanding of Chevron—which Sebastian bitterly resented, even while he conceded it;—she had a real genius for gaining the co…