"What reason should I have to be?"
"Then I'll ask you why you are. You must be, since there's no other way of explaining the curt way in which you have been answering me this long time."
"That's your own imagination. I answer you just as I always do."
Ricardo, without speaking, looked at his betrothed, who turned away her eyes, fixing them on Don Serapio.
"It must be so, but I don't understand it. If you are really angry with me, it would be very unkind of you not to tell me why, so that I could repair my mistake, if perchance I had committed any. My conscience does not accuse me of anything—"
"I tell you that I am not angry; don't be so tiresome!"
Maria said these words with evident asperity, not turning her face from the singer. Ricardo again looked at her for a long time.
"Very good—it is better so—still I thought—"
Both kept silence for some moments. Ricardo broke it, saying,—
"When Don Serapio has finished, they are going to make you sing; I am sure—all get good out of it except me."