"But I cannot go to New York."
"No? Not on a matter of this importance?"
"On no matter. I do not travel, Mr. Etheridge."
The pride and finality with which this was uttered, gave him his first glimpse of the hard streak which there was undoubtedly in her character. Though he longed to press the question he judged that he had better not, so suggested carelessly:
"Your sister, then?"
But she met this suggestion, as he had expected her to, with equal calmness and pride.
"My sister does not travel either."
He looked the astonishment he did not feel and remarked gravely:
"I fear, then, that the matter cannot be so easily adjusted." And he began to point out the difficulties in the way, to all of which she listened with a slightly absent air, as if the affair was in reality of no great importance to her.
Suddenly she waved her hand with a quick gesture.