He shook his head. There was a terrible obstinacy in his face. She frowned at him.
"You do not mean that you will persist after what I have told you?"
He looked at her, almost surprised.
"There isn't anything else for me to do, that I know of," he declared, "so long as you don't care for any one else. Tell me again, you are sure that there is no one?"
"Certainly not," she replied stiffly. "The subject has not yet been made acceptable to me. You must forgive my adding that in my country it is not usual for a girl to discuss these matters with a man before her betrothal."
"Say, I don't understand that," he murmured, looking at her thoughtfully. "She can't get engaged before she is asked."
"The preliminaries," she explained, "are always arranged by one's parents."
He smiled pityingly.
"That sort of thing's no use," he asserted confidently. "You must be getting past that, in whatever corner of Europe you live. What you mean to say, then, is that your father has some one up his sleeve whom he'll trot out for you before long?"
"Without doubt, some arrangement will be proposed," she agreed.