"Do you mean," says the girl, "that I have broken yours? Yours? Have I been so bad as that? Yours? I have been wilful, I know, and troublesome, but troublesome people do not break one's heart. What have I done then that yours should be broken?" She has moved closer to him. Her eyes are gazing with passionate question into his.
"Do not think of that," says the professor, unsteadily. "Do not let that trouble you. As I just now told you, I am a poor man, and poor men cannot afford such luxuries as hearts."
"Yet poor men have them," says the girl in a little low stifled tone. "And—and girls have them too!"
There is a long, long silence. To Curzon it seems as if the whole world has undergone a strange, wild upheaval. What had she meant—what? Her words! Her words meant something, but her looks, her eyes, oh, how much more they meant! And yet to listen to her—to believe—he, her guardian, a poor man, and she an heiress! Oh! no. Impossible.
"So much the worse for the poor men," says he deliberately.
There is no mistaking his meaning. Perpetua makes a little rapid movement towards him—an almost imperceptible one. Did she raise her hands as if to hold them out to him? If so, it is so slight a gesture as scarcely to be remembered afterwards, and at all events, the professor takes no notice of it, presumably, therefore, he does not see it.
"It is late," says Perpetua a moment afterwards. "I must go and dress for dinner." Her eyes are down now. She looks pale and shamed.
"You have nothing to say, then?" asks the professor, compelling himself to the question.
"About what?"
"Hardinge."