Page:Eliot - Middlemarch, vol. I, 1871.djvu/226

212 "I knew it would nettle you, Fred."

"Not at all. She would not have said so if you had not provoked her."

Before reaching home, Fred concluded that he would tell the whole affair as simply as possible to his father, who might perhaps take on himself the unpleasant business of speaking to Bulstrode.