“What do you mean by calling me ‘Polly’?” she asked, frigidly, and he hurriedly apologized.
“I beg your pardon. I forgot myself.”
They sat very still again, and Polly felt all the hot unrest and trouble unfold itself in her heart again. She could endure the bodily pain, but this was another kind of pain, and she fretted under it.
She seemed hemmed about as by a network of unpleasant circumstances. Of what use to run away, ostensibly, from her mother and her daily life; but, in reality, from the chance of meeting this man, and then to be thrown in close contact with him in the course of twenty-four hours.
She tried to fall back into her old sharp speech, but body, and heart, and brain were weary.
“After all, what does it matter? Call me what you like, it makes no difference.”
“Doesn’t it?” Valentine said, quickly. “That’s a big mistake—a very, big mistake.”
He had brought out her ulster, and she had let him throw it round her shoulders. Her hat she still kept on her lap.
“Oh! don’t let us discuss these sort of things,” she said, still wearily.
She did not understand him, but she felt a curious sensation that they were verging on something dangerous.