"I don't think so. It's as a pal I should want you chiefly, and you would be that. You are already."
She looked into the fire again, with a slight frown on her face. But it was only a frown of indecision. How should she have known enough about men to detect the unreality in that plea?
He waited for her to speak, putting strong constraint on himself.
"Oh, I can't," she said at last.
He took her hand. "Joan, my dear," he said, "will you marry me? I'll wait for what you can't give me now, and never worry you for it. Honour bright, I won't."
She let her hand remain in his for a moment, and then sprang up. "Oh, they're coming in," she cried.
He swore under his breath, but rose too, and said, as voices were heard approaching, "Think over it, and tell me to-morrow."
Joan lay awake for a long time that night. She had gone to bed when the others had driven off to their ball, about nine o'clock.
She was offered a way of escape—she did not examine herself as to what from. Bobby had been very nice to her—not silly, at all. Nobody else wanted her, Nancy least of all. Very likely Nancy was even now being offered her escape; the idea had got about that John Spence would unbosom himself to the sound of the violins. She would have liked to have talked to her mother, but had not had an opportunity. When she considered what she should say to her, when the opportunity came, she discovered that she did not want to say anything. If she had been able to tell her that she loved Bobby Trench, it would have been different. No, she did not love him. But she liked him—very much. And she liked Lord Sedbergh even more. She supposed she loved her father, in fact she was sure she did; but Lord Sedbergh would also be in the place of a father to her, if she married Bobby Trench, and it would not be wrong to love him, perhaps rather better. He would certainly know how to treat her better.
Should she—should she not?