“It is true in one sense, and not another.”
“Oh...” She seemed a little taken aback. “In what way is it true. Are you engaged to Miss Bootes?”
“Yes.”
“Indeed!”
She lifted her eyebrows, and moved a pace or two farther away.
“Don’t move away from me,” he said a little thickly. “It isn’t the part that’s true which matters, but the part that is not true.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I brought you here to explain. I can do so very quickly. I am in a tight corner. The tightest corner I ever was in my life. Only one thing can save me. I must have money. Miss Bootes, or at any rate her father, wants a title. I haven’t the shadow of a choice. I have got to sell her mine.”
Again Hal’s lips curled, and a little spark of fire shone in her eyes.
“Oh, I can understand all that!” She tossed her head half-unconsciously. “But why”—her lips quivered a little—“did you think it necessary to insult both of us by, at the same time, becoming lover-like to me?”