'Of all the inappropriate names!'
'Well,' said the millionaire, still smiling, 'I guess it must have been because I was always sort of gentle and confiding and sweet, you know. So they concluded to give me a girl's name as soon as they saw me, and I turned out a better cook than the others, so they tacked that on, too. I didn't mind.'
Margaret smiled too, as she glanced at his jaw and his flat, hard cheeks, and thought of his having been called 'Fanny.'
'Did you ever kill anybody, Miss Fanny?' she asked, with a little laugh.
A great change came over his face at once.
'Yes,' he answered very gravely. 'Twice, in fair self-defence. If I had hesitated, I should not be here.'
'I beg your pardon,' Margaret said quietly. 'I should not have asked you. I ought to have known.'
'Why?' he asked. 'One gets that kind of question [{233}] asked one now and then by people one doesn't care to answer. But I'd rather have you know something about my life than not. Not that it's much to be proud of,' he added, rather sadly.
'Some day you shall tell me all you will,' Margaret answered. 'I daresay you did much better than you think, when you look back.'
'Lady Maud knows all about me now,' he said, 'and no one else alive does. Perhaps you'll be the second that will, and that'll be all for the present. They want us to come up with them, do you see?'