"You're hard to understand, Ra—Miss Armitage," Mostyn said; "there's no doubt whatever about that, but I don't think you are a bit the minx you are inclined to make yourself out to be." He was staring at her, admiring her neat figure with its delicate curves, her nicely poised head, and her black curls that, in the sunlight, had a tint of glowing blue in them; he could not see her eyes, but he imagined that they must glint with the same blue. He wanted her to look up, but she still stared at the little well-shod foot with which she was still tapping the ground.
"Yes I am, I'm bad-tempered; I say cruel things; I hurt people! But why shouldn't I?" she added defiantly, "when there's no one I care for and no one who cares for me? I've been brought up like that. I am hard by nature, and I don't see why I should pretend to be any other than I am."
Mostyn laughed a little. "I know better," he said. "You've got a heart of gold, Miss Armitage, though out of sheer perversity you don't like people to know it. But I've found you out, you see, though we've only known each other such a little while and quarrelled every time we've met."
"What do you mean?" she cried. She was looking up now, and her eyes had the blue glint in them, just as he had expected. They flashed upon him, but he could not tell if it were with anger or surprise.
"You say that nobody loves you, and you love nobody. If so, why are you always doing little acts of kindness to people? Why do all the villagers adore you?"
She stamped her foot. "I've got to do something," she cried. "I must occupy myself somehow. But that isn't the real me, the real Rada Armitage; you are quite mistaken if you think so. I'm as you've seen me, as I appear up in London—hard, cruel, a flirt, everything that's bad. Ask my father; he always calls me a little devil; I've been called a little devil ever since I can remember."
"I know others who call you an angel, with an aspirate tacked on," Mostyn laughed. He was rather enjoying himself; it was amusing telling the girl her good qualities and hearing them so violently contradicted. It was Rada's nature to contradict, that was very evident, but it was quite delicious to make her protest that she was all that was bad when the truth was so palpably otherwise.
"What is one to believe, what you say yourself or what others say of you? I know what I think," he went on, more than half-conscious that he was goading the girl into a fresh passion. But how could she resent it when he was really praising her? "The real Rada Armitage is kind-hearted and good——"
"No she isn't, she's—oh, I don't know what you are making me say! You are perfectly horrid! What's the good of telling a girl she's an angel when she feels quite the reverse? That's just like a man." Rada turned away, angrily biting her lip. "I don't want to hear any more of my virtues, thank you, Mr. Clithero; I'd like you better if you told me I was a beast. And now please excuse me, for I'm going to the stables to see Jack Treves. He doesn't tell me I'm an angel," she added viciously.
Mostyn made no reply; and after waiting a moment as though she expected him to speak, Rada turned on her heel and went in search of her mare, which was quietly grazing close at hand.