“You aren’t really crying, are you?” he demanded.
Pauline made no answer.
In crying she had lost herself. She had given herself away—she had precipitated a crisis which, in any event, could not have been long postponed. In a word, he tried to comfort her. You may guess how he did it. You may guess whether she objected. You may guess if he succeeded. In a quarter of an hour she was telling him that she had always liked him, that, formerly, she and Rosie used to worship him—Rosie even more than she—but that that sort of worship was nothing compared to the feelings which she at present entertained—et seq.
And the fireworks and the applause of the vast crowd provided the kind of setting that Carlos Carpentaria loved.