You are right, of course.

[ A pause, and then she reaches to turn her teacup, making a soft scraping sound against the saucer. ]

I do not mean to excuse him, and I know myself to be impolite in continuing a dismissed subject, but—

I do not think it pride he defends so ardently. I think it his heart. That sometimes he hurts so badly that it is all that he can manage to see, and that he has spent so long powerless that he truly does not understand the dynamics of his power and influence nor the wielding of it.

It does not make it right to ask others to bear the consequences, but... if you give a poor man a fortune, he does not of a sudden cease to understand himself in the world as poor.

[ She pauses again, then shakes her head as if undergoing the same brisk spring cleaning that made Wysteria throw open the curtains, and the smile that follows is bright again. ]

No, you are right. Let us speak no more of it. I have come to no harm, and I am pleased you find yourself so fortified.

Perhaps you should like to tell me how it was you were going about constructing some means of destroying everything? I did not dream that part.