“No; but I am serious.” He looked away. Lee fancied that his triple coat of tan really paled. “I’ve never been so upset in my life,” he continued lucidly.
“It never did take you long to come to the point. What a relief—there are not to be a half-dozen weeks of flirtatious fencing. Do come out with it.”
He laughed, but without any great amount of ease. “I’ll be perfectly frank,” he said. “I saw your photograph in New York; I nearly went off my head. I lay awake all night. It was the first time any woman had bowled me over. My two or three fancies were hardly worth recalling. You see, I put your beauty with all I knew of you mentally, and of our delightful companionship when you were older than most girls of your age—and the sweetest little thing!—and the combination made my brain whirl. Before morning I wrote you that letter——”
“Well?”
Lee was twirling her lorgnette, her eyes lowered. Cecil had not removed his eyes from the horizon. He spoke jerkily, with an evident effort.
“When I cooled down, I was sorry I had sent that letter,” he brought out brutally, after an instant’s further hesitation. “You see, I had never thought of you in that way at all, or I shouldn’t even have started for California. I don’t believe in international marriages——”
“But, my dear Cecil,” exclaimed Lee, opening wide surprised eyes, “we’re not going to marry! I settled all that long ago.”
Cecil was too perturbed and too masculine to mark the rapid change of tactics. He turned his face about and stared at her. He was visibly paler, and his eyes were almost black.
“You have not settled it as far as I’m concerned,” he said. “I knew it was all up with me when you came toward me down that avenue. I’ve done nothing but deliberate for five weeks; I’ve weighed every pro and con; I’ve recalled every scene between my father and stepmother; I’ve argued with myself on the folly of marrying anything under a fortune; and the moment I saw you I knew that I had wasted five weeks, and that I should marry you if you would have me.”
Lee’s eyes had returned to the study of her lap. Pride and passion battled again. After a full moment’s silence, she looked up with so sweet a smile that he leaned forward impulsively to take her hand. But she drew it back.