Ida had found her life at Laburnum Villa hard enough in all conscience
before the night of the concert, but it became still harder after Mr.
Joseph's condescending avowal of love to her and her inevitably
scornful refusal. She avoided him as much as possible, but she was
forced to meet him at the family breakfast, a meal of a cold and dismal
character, generally partaken of by the amiable family in a morose and
gloomy silence or to an accompaniment of irritable and nagging personal
criticism. Mr. Heron, who suffered from indigestion, was always at his
worst at breakfast time; Mrs. Heron invariably appeared meaner and more
lachrymose; Isabel more irritable and dissatisfied; and Joseph, whose
bloodshot eyes and swollen lips testified to the arduous character of
his "late work at the office," went through the pretence of a meal with
a sullen doggedness which evinced itself by something like a snarl if
any one addressed him.

Hitherto he had, of course, been particularly, not to say unpleasantly,
civil to Ida, but after his repulse his manner became marked by a
covert insolence which was intended to remind her of her dependent
position, and the fact that her most direct means of escape from it was
by accepting him as her lover. This manner of his, offensive as it was
intended to be, Ida could have borne with more or less equanimity; for
to her, alas! Joseph Heron seemed of very little more account then one
of the tradesmen's boys she saw occasionally coming up to the house;
but after treating her to it for a day or two in the hope of breaking
her spirit, as he would have expressed it, his manner changed to one of
insinuating familiarity. He addressed her in a low voice, almost a
whisper, so that his sister and mother could not hear, and he smiled
and nodded at her in a would-be mysterious manner, as if they were
sharing some secret.