Page:The Adventures of David Simple (1904).djvu/343

 "However, this passed on three or four days, and neither of them spoke. Corinna dressed and went abroad with as much cheerfulness as usual; till he held out so long that she began to be frighted lest he should be meditating some design of parting with her, and by that means bring a disgrace upon her. Her pride would not suffer her to think of a submission; besides, she knew that method would be totally ineffectual with a man of her husband's temper. "Sacharissa, although she could not approve her behaviour, had so much good-nature, she would willingly have assisted her in bringing about a reconciliation; but her mind was so perfectly free from all art, and every word she spoke—nay, her very looks—so plainly showed her thoughts, that it was impossible for her to hit on any scheme for her sister's advantage. Corinna, after much deliberation, as her last effort, engaged a lady of her acquaintance to invite her and her husband to dinner; where, as by accident, they were to meet the gentleman who was the first occasion of their quarrel; who, the moment he saw Corinna, began to behave to her with all the assurance of a man who fancies himself the object of admiration can be inspired with. But she had now another scheme in view; and as she had before indulged her own vanity at the expense of her husband's, she thought it necessary, in order to bring about her present designs, to turn the man into ridicule, who, from her own behaviour, had fed himself with the hopes of obtaining her favour; and while she played him off with all the liveliness and wit she was mistress of, by the whole company's plainly perceiving the great preference she gave her husband he was by degrees worked into raptures he never felt for her before, and when they came home was visibly more her slave than ever. "Thus, by following the maxim she had laid