"I suppose it means that you are thinking whether you will marry Lord Lindfield or not," she said.
Daisy, however peremptory, was not a bully.
"How did you guess that, dear?" she asked.
"It wasn't very difficult. It couldn't have been, you see, or I shouldn't have guessed it. But he has been—well, a good deal interested in you, hasn't he, and you——"
"Do you mean I've encouraged him?" asked Daisy, with an inquisitorial air.
"No, I mean just the opposite. You've rather snubbed him." Gladys made a huge demand on her courage. "But you've snubbed him in such a way that it comes to the same thing as if you had encouraged him," she said.
Daisy considered this.
"I think you've got a horrid mind, Gladys," she said at length. "If I encourage somebody you tell me I am flirting, and if I discourage him you tell me it comes to the same thing. And you do me an injustice. I haven't snubbed or discouraged him. I've—I've remained neutral, until I could make up my mind. Do you think he cares for me? I really don't know whether he does or not. I can always tell with the gentle, good people like Willie, and it is gentle, good people whom I see most. Oh!"
Daisy gave a great sigh, and leant out over the folded door of the hansom.
"I'm not sure if I want to marry Lord Lindfield or not," she said, "but I'm perfectly certain that I don't want him to marry anybody else. I think I should like him always to remain wanting to marry me, while I didn't want to marry him. I'm dreadfully glad you think that I can snub or encourage him, because that means that you think he cares. I should be perfectly miserable if I thought he didn't."