“It is very good in you to talk to me as though we were the strangers that people believe us. I appreciate it and thank you very much. But it is not being just true; that is I feel as if I were not being just true, and as we can never be friends, would it not be better for us not to meet in this way any more?”
“And why,” I gently asked, with a sense of struggling for my life, “can we never be friends?”
Her answer was a deep blush; not that timid conscious appeal of the blood that is beating too warmly for reply, but the quick flush of indignant generosity forced to do despite to its own instincts.
“That is a question I would rather not answer,” she murmured at length. “Only it is so; or I should not speak in this way.”
“But,” I ventured, resolved to know on just what foundations my happiness was tottering, “you will at least tell me if this harsh decree is owing to any offence I myself may have inadvertently given. The honor of your acquaintance,” I went on, determined she should know just what a hope she was slaying, “is much too earnestly desired, for me to wilfully hazard its loss by saying or doing aught that could be in any way displeasing to you.”
“You have done nothing but what was generous,” said she with increasing womanliness of manner, “unless it was taking advantage of my being here, to learn my name and gain an introduction to me after I had desired you to forget my very existence.”
I recoiled at that, the chord of my self-respect was touched. “It was not here I learned your name, Miss Preston. It has been known to me for