She said nothing and he only
grunted. But I guess he had a bad time.
Yes, the mental deterioration that Florence worked in Leonora was
extraordinary; it smashed up her whole life and all her chances. It
made her, in the first place, hopeless--for she could not see how,
after that, Edward could return to her--after a vulgar intrigue with
a vulgar woman. His affair with Mrs Basil, which was now all that
she had to bring, in her heart, against him, she could not find it in
her to call an intrigue. It was a love affair--a pure enough thing in
its way. But this seemed to her to be a horror--a wantonness, all
the more detestable to her, because she so detested Florence. And
Florence talked. . . .
That was what was terrible, because Florence forced Leonora
herself to abandon her high reserve--Florence and the situation. It
appears that Florence was in two minds whether to confess to me
or to Leonora. Confess she had to. And she pitched at last on
Leonora, because if it had been me she would have had to confess
a great deal more. Or, at least, I might have guessed a great deal
more, about her "heart", and about Jimmy. So she went to Leonora
one day and began hinting and hinting.
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