"Who is watching us?" said Burgo; "and what does it matter? If you are minded to do as I have asked you—"
"But I am not so minded. Do you not know that you insult me by proposing it?"
"Yes;—it is an insult, Cora,—unless such an offer be a joy to you. If you wish to be my wife instead of his, it is no insult."
"How can I be that?" Her face was not turned to him, and her words were half-pronounced, and in the lowest whisper, but, nevertheless, he heard them.
"Come with me,—abroad, and you shall yet be my wife. You got my letter? Do what I asked you, then. Come with me—to-night."
The pressing instance of the suggestion, the fixing of a present hour, startled her back to her propriety. "Mr. Fitzgerald," she said, "I asked you to go and leave me. If you do not do so, I must get up and leave you. It will be much more difficult."
"And is that to be all?"
"All;—at any rate, now." Oh, Glencora! how could you be so weak? Why did you add that word, "now"? In truth, she added it then, at that moment, simply feeling that she could thus best secure an immediate compliance with her request.
"I will not go," he said, looking at her sternly, and leaning before her, with earnest face, with utter indifference as to the eyes of any that might see them. "I will not go till you tell me that you will see me again."
"I will," she said in that low, all-but-unuttered whisper.