Patty pondered the question. "I can't get near enough to him either to like or dislike him. He is very good looking."
"He is more than good looking. He is magnificent."
"You think a great deal of him?"
"I couldn't think more," he responded with young enthusiasm. "Every one feels that way about him. He stands for—well, for everything that one would like to be."
"I've heard of him, of course," said the girl slowly. "Father has been fighting him ever since he went into politics; but I never saw Mr. Benhem close enough to speak to him until the other evening." She raised her black lashes and looked straight at Stephen with her challenging glance. "All the men seemed so serious, except you."
He laughed and flushed slightly. "And I did not?"
Though her manner could not have been more indifferent, there was an undercurrent of feeling in her voice, as if she meant something more than she had put into words. He might take it as he chose, lightly or seriously, her look implied—and it was, he admitted, a thrilling look from such eyes as hers.
"You are nearer my age," she rejoined, "though you do seem so old sometimes."
A depressing dampness fell on his mood. "Do I seem old to you? I am only twenty-six."
Her inquiring eyebrows were raised in mockery. "That is too old to play, isn't it?"