“Oh! I thought you implied——”
“But, of course, she knew he wanted to,” Maud put in. “Didn’t you, dear?”
“Well, I thought so,” said Isabel, modestly.
“Yes, I know you thought so,” said Laura. “Indeed, everybody saw that. Was it very hard to prevent him?”
Isabel’s colour rose. “I don’t know what you mean, Laura,” she said.
Laura smiled with an unpleasantness that was quite a victory over nature. “Men sometimes fancy,” she remarked, “that girls are rather in a hurry to think they want to propose.”
“Laura!” exclaimed Maud.
“They even say that the wish is father to the thought,” continued Laura, still smiling, but now a little tremulously.
Isabel grew more flushed. “I don’t understand you. One would think you meant that I had run after him.”
Laura remained silent.