“Really? Your words sound threatening,” she said, attempting to smile. “Well, you shall have your way,” and she threw aside her riding-whip pettishly. “You’ll have to wait until I change my dress; I cannot walk in my riding-habit.”
Tancredo was sent back to the stable, and in much less time than I could have imagined my cousin reappeared in a very neat walking-costume.
“And where shall we go?” she asked.
“Well, into the wood, I suppose.”
“That’s right, the weather is splendid: we can walk as far as the round point, and rest there on the rustic bench which you perhaps remember.”
And so we walked through the great lane towards the wood, silent, just because we had so much to say to each other. I had resolved to speak; but I could not decide in my own mind how to begin the subject. She herself seemed to have a thousand other things to talk about beside the one I wished to come to. At length I tried to change the subject by saying it would be necessary for me to fix a day for my return to the Hague.
“I was expecting it, Leopold.”
“And are you sorry I am going away?”
“I ought to say ‘No,’ by way of opposition, which is the only suitable answer to such a foolish question.”
“But I—will come back, if you would like it.”