“Know what?” he asked.
She laughed with embarrassment.
“It really isn't of any interest to you, but—” and again she paused.
“Suppose you let me be the judge of that,” he suggested stiffly. “You're making me horribly curious, you know. You can't very well drop the subject now.” He was evidently making an effort at pleasantry.
She flushed brightly.
“Of course it couldn't be of the slightest importance to anyone except myself,” she explained. Then, as if doubting her courage to continue long, she hurried on, “but one reason I take such an interest in—your work is because I'm a direct descendant of Lord Harold myself. He became the Duke of Norfolk afterward, you know, but Hastings was always the family name.” She flashed him a haughty glance, a pride that changed to wide-eyed surprise as she noted his amazement.
“Not really?” He had turned abruptly and in his eyes there was a curious expression, almost of alarm. “How extraordinary,—how perfectly extraordinary!”
“Why extraordinary?” That her cup of humiliation might brim to the full, resentment was added to confusion. “You consider me unworthy, then, of having had nobility among my ancestry? But, just the same, there was nothing strange about it. The colonies were chiefly English, you remember!” He smiled at her sarcasm. “The duke married one of Elizabeth's ladies-in-waiting after he went home and there was a younger son, and he had a younger son, and after a long time one of them came over to Virginia just like anybody else. They have always been good, loyal, highly respected American citizens,” she told him fiercely, “and I'm proud of them! Besides—” with reckless emphasis, “I've always felt so sorry for Wildenai.”
But at this point, quite incomprehensibly, Blair broke into peals of laughter.
“And by and by, after a long, long time, one of these good, loyal, American citizens that we're both so proud of had a hot-tempered, most disloyal little daughter who intends to show her employer his proper place before she dismisses him! But why are you sorry for Wildenai?”