"Nothing more than common."
"Something has worried you. Now, Philip, I can see plainly that you are worrying about Phillida. Why don't you speak your mind if you care for her, and have it over with?"
"It is over with, mother," said Philip.
"And she refused you?" said Mrs. Gouverneur, with rising indignation, for she thought it rather a descent for Philip to offer himself to Phillida or to anybody else.
"No, she didn't refuse me. I didn't formally offer myself. But I let her know how I felt toward her. She'll never accept me."
"May be she will," said the mother. "Girls don't like to accept at the first hint."
"No, she was kind and even affectionate with me, and broke her heart over my confession that I loved her, so that I'm afraid I have done her a great deal of harm."
"How do you know she will never accept you, you faint-hearted boy?"
"She let me see her whole heart. She loves Charley Millard as much as ever, but, I think, for some reason she doesn't expect or wish a renewal of the engagement. She called me the best friend she had in the world, next to Charley Millard. That's an end of it. A good deal more of an end of it than a flat refusal might have been."
"She's a foolish and perverse girl, who has compromised her family and ruined her own prospects," said Mrs. Gouverneur. "Your aunt told me to-day that Dr. Gunstone thinks she is going to die of her disappointment about Charley unless the engagement can be renewed. But Phillida has determined not to allow a renewal of it. She's always doing something foolish. Now, eat a little dinner, or take your coffee at least."