"'I've been trying to please other people all my life and failed,' she said. 'After this I shall please myself. I shall never pretend anything again. I've breathed an atmosphere of fibs and pretences and evasions all my life. What a luxury it will be to tell the truth!'"
Valancy's mother and Cousin Stickles (what a name!) are first on the receiving end of the results of her declaration of independence, and they are badly shaken. Meek, nervous, biddable Doss has become headstrong and is behaving contrary to their wishes and demands. And she is indifferent to either their outrage or their pleas about family duty. After a couple weeks of this, the two women are extremely nervous about taking Valancy to the family anniversary party... who knows what sort of outlandish or outrageous thing she might say, and to whom. They are correct; in response to various family members impertinent and obnoxious remarks, Valancy impishly starts saying all the mocking things that previously she had just thought. The result is the most interesting- and amusing- dinner party that the Stirlings have ever had, although most of them don't think so. They are shocked and angered by Valancy's irreverent treatment of them, especially since this is so out of character for her. They are especially scandalised when Valancy mounts a spirited defence of social outcast Barney Snaith who, since he keeps to himself, is the subject of speculation and suspicion that he is responsible for every crime and ill-done deed in the region since he arrived five years previously. This includes, as Uncle Wellington insinuates, fathering the illegitimate child of Cecily Gay, the daughter of town drunk Roaring Abel. Done with insinuations, Valancy bluntly states that this is a wicked lie and says that they should leave Cecily alone; she's dying, and doesn't need malicious gossip about her as an added punishment for whatever she's done. A little shocked at her own vehemence, Valancy realises that a good deal of her anger is at the accusation that Barney Snaith could have seduced and betrayed anyone:
"Valancy didn't exactly understand her own indignation. What did Barney Snaith's imputed crimes and misdemeanours matter to her? And why, out of them all, did it seem most intolerable that he should have been poor, pitiful little Cecily Gay's false lover? For it did seem intolerable to her. She did not mind when they called him a thief and a counterfeiter and jail-bird; but she could not endure to think that he had loved and ruined Cecily Gay. She recalled his face on the two occasions of their chance meetings--his twisted, enigmatic, engaging smile, his twinkle, his thin, sensitive, almost ascetic lips, his general air of frank daredeviltry. A man with such a smile and lips might have murdered or stolen but he could not have betrayed. She suddenly hated every one who said it or believed it of him."