“I am not your match in these sort of subtle discussions,” said he, bluntly, “but I know what I say is fact.”
“That I'm a coquette?” said she, with so much feigned horror that Jack could scarcely keep down the temptation to laugh.”
“Just so; for the mere pleasure of displaying some grace or some attraction, you 'd half kill a fellow with jealousy, or drive him clean mad with uncertainty. You insist on admiration—or what you call 'homage,' which I trust is only a French name for it—and what's the end of it all? You get plenty of this same homage; but—but—never mind. I suppose I'm a fool to talk this way. You 're laughing at me besides, all this while. I see it—I see it in your eyes.”
“I was n't laughing, Jack, I assure you. I was simply thinking that this discovery—I mean of my coquetry—was n't yours at all. Come, be frank and own it. Who told you I was a coquette, Jack?”
“You regard me as too dull-witted to have found it out, do you?”
“No, Jack. Too honest-hearted—too unsuspecting, too generous, to put an ill construction where a better one would do as well.”
“If you mean that there are others who agree with me, you're quite right.”
“And who may they be?” asked she, with a quiet smile. “Come, I have a right to know.”