Francie started visibly; “No, I know you don’t,” she said, facing him suddenly, like some trapped creature; “I know you’re in love with somebody else!”
His eyes flinched as though a light had been flashed in them. “What do you mean?” he said quickly, while a rush of blood darkened his face to the roots of his yellow hair, and made the veins stand out on his forehead; “who told you that?”
“It doesn’t matter who told me,” she said with a miserable satisfaction that her bolt had sped home; “but I know it’s true.”
“I give you my honour it’s not!” he said passionately; “you might have known better than to believe it.”
“Oh yes, I might,” she said with all the scorn she was master of; “but I think ’twas as good for me I didn’t.” Her voice collapsed at the end of the sentence, and the dry sob that rose in her throat almost choked her. She stood up and turned her face away to hide the angry tears that in spite of herself had sprung to her eyes.
Hawkins caught her hand again and held it tightly. “I know what it is. I suppose they’ve been telling you of that time I was in Limerick; and that was all rot from beginning to end; anyone could tell you that.”
“It’s not that; I heard all about that—”
Hawkins jumped up. “I don’t care what you heard,” he said violently. “Don’t turn your head away from me like that, I won’t have it. I know that you care about me, and I know that I shouldn’t care if everyone in the world was dead, so long as you were here.” His arm was round her, but she shook herself free.
“What about Miss Coppard?” she said; “what about being married before Christmas?”
For a moment Hawkins could find no words to say. “So you’ve got hold of that, have you,” he said, after some seconds of silence that seemed endless to Francie. “And do you think that will come between us?”