“And why so, Alice dearest?”
“Can you ask me?”
“I mean, why not receive him on the terms of an easy intimacy? A person of his tact is always quick enough to appreciate the exact amount of favor he is held in.”
“It is of myself I am thinking,—not of him,” said she, with something of resentment in her tone.
“If you speak this way, Alice, I shall believe that you care for him.”
“The greater mistake yours, my dear Bella.”
“Well—that you did once care for him, and regret the fact, or regret the change,—which is it?”
“Neither, on my honor! He interested me,—I own to that; but now that I know his mystery, and what a vulgar mystery it is, I am half ashamed that I even felt an interest in him.”
“Gossip would say you did more, Alice,—that you gave him encouragement.”
“What an odious word you have impressed into your service! but I deny it; nor was he one to want it. Your adventurer never does.”