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ized. It is my party. Leave it all to me. I will invite your guests."
"No,"—he calmly replied,—"there is but one married woman in the world whom I can ever allow to invite what guests she pleases to Donwell, and that one is——"
"—Mrs. Weston, I suppose," interrupted Mrs. Elton, rather mortified.
"No—Mrs. Knightley;—and, till she is in being, I will manage such matters myself."
"Ah! you are an odd creature!" she cried, satisfied to have no one preferred to herself.—"You are a humourist, and may say what you like. Quite a humourist. Well, I shall bring Jane with me—Jane and her aunt.—The rest I leave to you. I have no objections at all to meeting the Hartfield family. Don't scruple. I know you are attached to them."
"You certainly will meet them if I can prevail; and I shall call on Miss Bates in my way home."
