This disconcerted him but he replied:
"It's likely I'd quit."
"I'm ... wholly distasteful to you, then?"
"If I was to say yes, it'd hurt your feelings, needless. So I won't. I don't mind tellin' you, though, that the country is calling me your chaperone."
"And does what people say worry you?"
"Not when they talk about something that I'm responsible for. I didn't hire out as a ... a companion, ma'am."
She stepped closer, hands behind her and said:
"The first time you talked to me at any length you had a great deal to say about respect. No one had ever talked to me as you did. I took it because it was true ... and I respected you.
"Since that time I have been trying to be worthy of the respect of you men; of yours particularly because you are the only one with whom I have talked so frankly about myself. But at every turn you repulse me, drive me back. Nothing that I do seems to be pleasing to you. You pick on me, Tom Beck! Why do you do it?"
He eyed her calculatingly.