“Why not?” was on the tip of her tongue; he saw it there. But she caught at herself, and answered, “So, sir, like sour reynard, I suppose, you would spite what you found it useless to covet.”
“I covet, madam!” he said, in a tone of astonishment. “I aspire to wrest this wealth and beauty from a hundred worthier candidates! Believe me, my ambition halted far short of such attainment.”
Her lips smiled, despite herself. What were the value, she suddenly thought, in a world of suitors that did not include this shagg’d and rugged Jeremiah? Her speech fell as caressing as the sound of water in a wood.
“Yet you confess to some ambition?” she murmured.
“True,” he answered; “the virtuoso’s.”
She lifted her beautiful brows.
“I will be candid, madam,” he said. “I have the collector’s itch. Whithersoever I visit, I lay my toll on the most characteristic productions of the tribes—robes, carvings, implements of war—even scalps. Madam, madam, you must surely be of the sun children! Your hair is the most lovely thing! I would give my soul—more, I would give a thousand pounds to possess it.”
“I see, sir,” she said; “to carry your conquest at your belt.”
“Nay,” he answered, with feigned eagerness. “Not a soul need know. The thing is done constantly. You have but to subscribe to the fashion of powder, and you gain a novel beauty, and I a secret I swear to hold inviolate.”
“O!” she said softly “This is Samson come with the shears to turn the tables on poor Delilah!”