“Shall we hurt them?” Anne asked demurely.
After the humiliation of the past hour, it was balm to feel herself again. Never had she liked her companion so well.
“I’m in the humour to do any one a harm who comes in my way,” he muttered. “Anne!”
She lifted her eyebrows.
“Isn’t she a new person?”
“Look here,” he said, disregarding, “I got a hint that if I bothered you to-day my chance was up. I’ve tried, ’pon my soul I’ve tried, to keep off, and I can’t. When I’d driven Martyn a few miles, I had to make an excuse and turn back again, and here I am by your side, and—”
He tried to possess himself of her hand, but she drew it away. Not so, however, as to show displeasure. The very audacity of ignoring her commands pleased her, since she flattered herself he found the task impossible, and contrasting the two, she scourged Wareham in her thoughts.
“Anne, will you marry me?”
“What were you told?”
“That you were to be left in peace. I vowed I would. But when I heard that you were with that fellow Wareham—”