‘Perfectly sure,’ answered Roma quietly.
Maud looked rather blank. Something in Roma’s manner carried conviction with it.
‘I suppose father has been talking to you,’ she said. ‘I wish he would not. It is one of his fancies, Maud, that your brother is to marry me; but he never will. He does not care for me, nor I for him—in that way.’
‘But your father said he had spoken about it—Phil, I mean.’
A look of pain crossed Roma’s face.
‘That means, I suppose, that father has spoken to Mr. Debenham—I wish he would not. Your brother is kind, and humours him because agitation is so bad for him. Please do not talk to me any more about it. It is a horrid state of affairs. But you may be quite sure that your brother and I will never marry.’
‘Would you refuse him if he asked you?’
‘He never will ask me.’
‘But suppose he did,’ urged Maud. ‘You know he might, Roma; he likes you very much.’
The girl clasped her hands tightly together, with a look of keen pain upon her face.