"I felt that you did not understand."
"Understand what?" She looked at him with puzzled eyes. "I may be incredibly stupid, but I don't understand now."
For an instant he hesitated, and she watched a deeper flush rise in his face. "In a way you are under my protection," he said at last, "and for this reason I have meant to warn you against Roane Fitzhugh—against the danger of these meetings."
"These meetings?" Light burst on her while she stared on him. "Is it possible that you think this was a meeting? Do you dream that I have been seeing Roane Fitzhugh of my own accord? Have you dared to think such a thing? To imagine that I wanted to see him—that I came out to meet him?" The note of scorn ended in a sob while she buried her face in her hands, and stood trembling with shame and anger before him.
"But I understood. I was told——" He was stammering awkwardly. "Isn't it true that you felt an interest—that you were trying to help him?"
At this her rage swept back again, and dropping her hands, she lifted her swimming eyes to his face. "How dare you think such a thing of me?"
"I am sorry." He was still groping in darkness. "You mean you did not know he was coming to-day?"
"Of course I didn't know. Do you think I should have come out if I had known?"
"And you have never met him before? Never expected to meet him?"
"Oh, what are you saying? Why can't you speak plainly?" A shiver ran through her.