"She's such a queer girl, Mr. Lighton," she said, shyly yet impulsively, "oh, I know she's my own cousin and perhaps I oughtn't to say so but"—
"Isn't she?" inquired the disconsolate lover, eagerly. "As you're her cousin, I suppose I can say so"—
"Anything you say," said Agatha, dimpling seraphically, "is quite safe with me, Mr. Lighton—anything!" She raised her deep, soulful eyes to him with an air of rapt attention and Mr. Lighton found himself murmuring involuntarily, "What a charming girl!"
"All I was going to say was," he continued, returning to the attack, but half forgetting his griefs in the joy of finding such an intelligent listener, "that your cousin really doesn't treat a fellow fairly. Now she won't listen to anything a fellow tries to tell her. All she will say is, 'Surely we have discussed this often enough, Mr. Lighton; do talk of something else!' Now, hang it all, Miss Ladilaw, that's rude!"
"I should think it was," exclaimed Agatha, looking appropriately shocked and grieved and inwardly wondering whether any man could spend an hour in her society and bestow a thought afterwards on a plain girl like Lynn.
"And then, when I tell her she is rude, all she will say is, 'I wonder you come to see me so often when I am so unpleasant and there are so many nice girls in the world.'" He paused.
"Ah!" said Agatha, softly, wondering inwardly why he did; and wondering, moreover, whether it was too soon to ask him to drop in some quiet evening when she was quite sure of having no other callers, in order that they might the more fully discuss her cousin's iniquities.
"And then to have her add the finishing touch by refusing me outright after all the time I've spent on"——
"What?" said Agatha, startled, for once, out of all semblance of good manners. Was the man in earnest? Had he actually proposed? and had the fool—for no other word seemed appropriately to describe her cousin—had the fool refused him? Agatha gasped and caught her breath. Refused him! refused a horse and carriage and a nice house and a trip to Europe if she wanted it? Agatha could scarcely regain her composure.
"Yes, indeed, she refused me," reiterated the Rejected One, indignantly. "And she not only refused me but she told me that I would thank her for her refusal ten years hence."