"At least a man doesn't want to force the dilemma on her." Possibly he did not succeed in saying it entirely without stiffness.
"If I'd been afraid of your doing that," she reminded him, "I might have changed my sailing date."
"I was just a little surprised that you didn't," he admitted.
A strolling couple passed and Marian watched them turn out of sight before she spoke again.
"As a matter of fact, I did change it. I left the friends with whom I'd been traveling and took this earlier steamer home." She caught the expression of surprise in his face, but before he could put it into words she heightened it to amazement with the calm announcement: "I did that because Lieutenant Hancock told me that you were sailing by it."
"But I—I don't understand!"
"No. You wouldn't."
"I'm dense, I suppose," he acknowledged, "but I should have fancied the only result of that would be unpleasant gossip."
"Yes, Stuart, you are dense," she interrupted, and into her eyes leaped an insurgent flame of scorn. "Why should I care what gossips thought? Their verdict was rendered long since. I had a reason more important to myself than their opinions."