"No doubt of that! I have discovered a great deal in my time; but in the meanwhile I shall talk this over fully with Agnes to-morrow."
"Do not speak of to-morrow, when to-day is the happiest, perhaps, in my life! I wish there were no to-morrows! Such an hour as this appears to me like an aloe, which can blossom only once in my existence."
"You entertain very moderate expectations of life, therefore I think we may confidently rely on your being agreeably surprised by many days as pleasant."
"Then they must be passed in the same society; but Miss Dunbar, it always seems as if you would rather say 'Good bye' to me than 'How d'ye do!' You treat me with the most barbarous injustice! Your heart never teaches you to understand mine! Is it that you hate or despise me? You are so amiable to others, so charming, so everything that I could admire, yet to me your smiles are as cold and chilling as a moon-beam on snow. Be severe, satirical, anything but half absent and altogether indifferent, while you listen to me only with the ear and not at all with the heart. I shall positively be obliged at last to give you up."
"I wish you would! We might be the best of friends as well as cousins, if you would only talk to me in an everyday manner, without rehearsing over those absurd Romeo-and-Juliet speeches."
"Let us, then, be friends now, and more than friends in time to come."
"Never! O never! Patrick has led you to disbelieve my engagement to another; but at all events, Captain De Crespigny, if we lived in separate planets we could not be more entirely divided; and even in jest, I cannot allow any one to talk as you do, though I know it is merely an unconquerable habit you have of saying the same thing to every young lady, indiscriminately."
"What a shocking aspersion! you seem to think me incapable of a single respectable feeling, but believe me, since first we met I have scarcely known whether there be another girl in the world but yourself! Every moment I can be with you adds something to the value of my existence."
"Your civilities are all so complete a burlesque that I need never forget they are in jest!" replied Marion, looking considerably bored, and hurrying onwards, while Captain De Crespigny buried himself in melancholy silence, and assumed a most perfect attitude of graceful despair. Finding the pause rather awkward, she added, in an every day, commonplace tone: "Are you going to hear Grisi to-night? I am told that large sums are given for places on the heads of those who have already secured seats!"
"If I go to Grisi's concert, the temptation is—not to hear him—that you know very well—too well! I have but one object in going anywhere, and that is—to meet you. Esperer aupres de vous vaut mieux que jouir avec tout autre. I must quarrel with that little shake of the head. It is a libel on my sincerity! Miss Dunbar, your face is a perfect printing press, and publishes all you think! I wish you possessed the magic ring which enabled people to know exactly what was thought of them! You are in my debt several months of devoted attachment! Little do you guess how often and how deeply your slightest words are pondered, remembered, repeated, and dwelt upon in my solitary hours, nor how constantly I wish that the man in the moon, who employs his leisure in knitting people together with invisible cords, would, for my especial happiness, give us a few stitches."