tephen was of opinion that poor old Hilary
must look out what he was doing. Beyond this he did not go, keeping even
from his wife the more unpleasant of what seemed to him the
possibilities.

Then, in the words she had used to Hilary, Cecilia spoke:

"It's so sordid, Stephen."

He looked at her, and almost with one accord they both said:

"But it's all nonsense!"

These speeches, so simultaneous, stimulated them to a robuster view. What
was this affair, if real, but the sort of episode that they read of in
their papers? What was it, if true, but a duplicate of some bit of
fiction or drama which they daily saw described by that word "sordid"?
Cecilia, indeed, had used this word instinctively. It had come into her
mind at once. The whole affair disturbed her ideals of virtue and good
taste--that particular mental atmosphere mysteriously, inevitably woven
round the soul by the conditions of special breeding and special life.
If, then, this affair were real it was sordid, and if it were sordid it
was repellent to suppose that her family could be mixed up in it; but her
people were mixed up in it, therefore it must be--nonsense!

So the matter rested until Thyme came back from her visit to her
grandfather, and told them of the little model's new and pretty clothes.
When she detailed this news they were all sitting at dinner, over the
ordering of which Cecilia's loyalty had been taxed till her little
headache came, so that there might be nothing too conventional to
over-nourish Stephen or so essentially aesthetic as not to nourish him at
all. The man servant being in the room, they neither of them raised
their eyes. But when he was gone to fetch the bird, each found the other
looking furtively across the table. By some queer misfortune the word
"sordid" had leaped into their minds again. Who had given her those
clothes? But feeling that it was sordid to pursue this thought, they
looked away, and, eating hastily, began pursuing it. Being man and
woman, they naturally took a different line of chase, Cecilia hunting in
one grove and Stephen in another.

Thus ran Stephen's pack of meditations:

'If old Hilary has been giving her money and clothes and that sort of
thing, he's either a greater duffer than I took him for, or there's
something in it. B.'s got herself to thank, but that won't help to keep
Hughs quiet. He wants money, I expect. Oh, damn!'

Cecilia's pack ran other ways:

'I know the girl can't