"Oh, please, don't, don't,"—she raised her hands and covered her face,—"I hardly know that, even now, I have the strength to carry out my uncle's wishes."
"But when?" he asked, more soberly.
"In three days. Frank is getting a special licence; we are——" She hesitated, and he waited.
"We are going to Paris," she said, with a pink flush in her face, "but Frank wishes that we shall live"—she stopped again, and then went on almost defiantly—"that we shall live apart, although we shall not be able to preserve that fact a secret."
He nodded.
"I understand," he said; "therein Mr. Doughton shows an innate delicacy, which I greatly appreciate."
Again that little sense of resentment swept through her; the patronage in his tone, the indefinable suggestion of possession was, she thought, uncalled for. That he should approve of Frank in that possessive manner was not far removed from an impertinence.
"Have you thought?" he asked, after a while, "what would happen if you did not marry Frank Doughton in accordance with your uncle's wishes—what terrible calamity would fall upon your uncle?"
She shook her head.
"I do not know," she said, frankly. "I am only beginning to get a dim idea of Mr. Farrington's real character. I always thought he was a kindly and considerate man; now I know him to be——" She stopped, and Poltavo supplied her deficiency of speech.