CHAPTER VIII.
STORMY SCENES.
"Have a care how thou dost answer me, Mistress; I am not one who brooks trifling!"
"I have never trifled with thee, Roger de Horn," answered the maiden addressed, speaking firmly though gently. "Methinks thou dost forget thyself in speaking such words to me to-day."
The dark face of Roger was deeply flushed. He looked as though he had been drinking—as indeed was probably the case; at any rate he was very angry, and his words came hissing from between his teeth in a fashion not pleasant to hear.
"Not trifled with me, quotha? Canst thou look me in the face and say that?—whilst the love-token that thou didst give me lies now upon my heart!"
The face of Linda Balzani flushed deeply, partly with anger, partly with maiden modesty. She drew herself away with a gesture full of simple dignity.
"I have given thee no token," she said. "If thou hast received aught, it must be from the hands of my sister. I know nothing of any token."
"What!" cried the young man, the flush mounting even to his brow, "wilt thou deny the kiss that thou didst bestow upon me out in the greenwood on Midsummer Eve, and the token thou didst give me as proof of thy love?"