But she stood her ground, making an impatient movement with one foot.
“No, Bram, you must tell me now. What was it all about?”
He hesitated. Even if he were able to put her off now, which seemed unlikely, she must hear the truth some day. It was only selfishness, the horror of himself giving her pain, which urged him to be reticent now. So he said to himself, doggedly preparing for his avowal. His anger against the Cornthwaites, his fear of hurting her, combined to make his tone sullen and almost fierce as he answered—
“Well, Miss Claire, I was angry wi’ him because I thought he hadn’t behaved as he ought.”
There was a pause. It seemed to Bram that she guessed, with feminine quickness, what was coming. She spoke, after another of the short pauses with which their conversation was broken up, in a very low and studiously-restrained tone—
“How? To whom, Bram?”
“To—to you, Miss Claire,” answered Bram with blunt desperation.
Another silence.
“Why, what has he done to me?” asked she at last.
“He has gone and got engaged—to be married—to somebody else; that’s what he’s done, there!”