She slowly raised her eyes to his, and there was a wicked, mocking laugh in her look as she said in a low tone:
“Am I?”
“Yes, that you are,” he whispered in a low, passionate tone.
“You are laughing at me,” she said softly.
“’Pon my soul I’m not,” he whispered again; “I swear I’m not; and I love you—there, I can’t tell you how much. I say, don’t play with me. I’ll do anything you like—give you anything you like. I’ll make the princesses bite their lips with jealousy to see your jewels. I will, honour! May I? Yes? Slip it on? I say, my beautiful darling, when may I put on the plain gold one?”
“Oh, hush!” she whispered softly, as she surrendered her hand, and fixed her eyes in what he told himself was a loving, rapturous gaze upon his; “be content now.”
“But no games,” he whispered; “you’ll be my wife?”
“Yes,” she said in the same low tone, and he raised the beringed hand to his lips, while the Honourable Isabella uttered a little faint sigh, and her book trembled visibly in her attenuated hands.
“Hah!” ejaculated Mr Elbraham; and then to himself: “What things diamonds are!”
Perhaps he would have felt less satisfied if he had known that, when Clotilde fixed her eyes upon his, she was looking down a long vista of pleasure stretched out in the future.