"Do you ever play stupid at West Point?" Cherry said a little impatiently.
"No need to play it."
"Well, there is no need now," she said, springing up; "and I am going home till you come back to your common sense."
"No, don't go!" Magnus said, catching hold of her dress. "Sit down and lecture me, scold me, say what you will of me, only stay a while longer. Cherry, you do not know what it is to have the only girl in the world throw you off."
She turned then, and stood looking down at him; the fair face telling all he wanted to know; but, as Cherry had said, he was not well read in girls.
"Magnus," she said, "what makes you talk so? I am not 'the only girl in the world'—but I have not thrown you off. You know I could not do that. Unless——"
"Unless what?" he said eagerly.
"Unless I knew you had chosen such ways," the girl said, growing very white. "And then it would be you that had thrown me off."