'I have.'
She would have told him why: the words were at her lips. Previous to her emotion on the journey home, the words would have come out. They were arrested by the thunder of the knowledge, that the nobleness in him drawing her to be able to speak of scarlet matter, was personally worshipped.
He attributed the full rose upon her cheeks to the forbidding subject.
To spare pain, he said: 'No misunderstanding with the dear mother will last the day through. Can I help?'
'Oh, Captain Dartrey!'
'Drop the captain. Dartrey will do.'
'How could I!'
'You're not wanting in courage, Nesta.'
'Hardly for that!'
'By-and-by, then.'