“No, Julius; she knows that I do. You know it, too.”
“Love,” said the artist, “means faith, trust, fair play, and candor, among other things, I have always thought.”
“What do you mean by that, Julius?”
“Well, I don’t want to be unkind, Leonie; but do you think that a woman who truly loved a man would misrepresent her age to him; or that she would be absolutely silent respecting previous engagements that she had contracted? How do I know that you care more for me than you did for Baxter and the others?”
“Mr. Weems,” exclaimed Leonie, indignantly, “this is cruel. It is worse,—it is shameful. You seem to have known all there was to know, without seeking information from me.”
“That is what made it so very painful,” replied Mr. Weems, trying to look as if his feelings had experienced a terrible wrench. “It was dreadful to learn from outside sources what I should have heard from your own lips. When a woman pretends to give me her heart, I expect her to give me her confidence also.”
“Pretends!” exclaimed Leonie, rising. “Pretends! What do you mean, sir, by ‘pretends’! Do you dare to insinuate that I deliberately deceived you?”
“Well,” said Mr. Weems, calmly, “that is perhaps a rather violent construction of my language; but we will not quarrel over phrases.”
“I did not think,” said Leonie, tearfully but vehemently, “that I should be insulted when I came here,—insulted in the midst of my grief. It is unmanly, sir! It is cowardly! It is infamous!”
“I am sorry that you take that view of it. I did not intend to be discourteous, I am sure. Pray pardon me if I was so. It is clear, however, that, after what has passed, we can hardly sustain our former relation to each other.”