“I think you know the answer to that better than anyone,” he rejoined, his voice matching hers for earnestness. “It is because I love you; because I could not stay away if I should try. Forgive me, dear; I did not mean to speak so soon. But you said in your note that you would be leaving Argentine immediately—that I should not see you again: so I had to come. Won't you give me a word, Virginia?—a waiting word, if it must be that?”
Jastrow held his breath, hope dying within him and sullen ferocity crouching for the spring if her answer should urge it on. But when she spoke the secretary's anger cooled and he breathed again.
“No: a thousand times, no!” she burst out passionately; and Winton staggered as if the suddenly-freed hand had dealt him a blow.
X. SPIKED SWITCHES
For a little time after Virginia's passionate rejection of him Winton stood abashed and confounded. Weighed in the balance of the after-thought, his sudden and unpremeditated declaration could plead little excuse in encouragement. And yet she had been exceedingly kind to him.
“I have no right to expect a better answer,” he said finally, when he could trust himself to speak. “But I am like other men: I should like to know why.”
“You can ask that?” she retorted. “You say you have no right: what have you done to expect a better answer?”
He shrugged. “Nothing, I suppose. But you knew that before.”
“I only know what you have shown me during the past three weeks, and it has proved that you are what Mr. Adams said you were—though he was only jesting.”