"Now he thinks that we----" she began. Her sentence did not end, but there was something in her broken words that made the blood mount hotly to his brow.
"That's bad enough," he growled, and turned his back.
There was a silence. He drew out his watch, and studied the hands.
"I thank you, Leo, for coming to-day," she began again shyly, after a little while.
"Didn't you expect me, then?" he asked.
"Oh, you know you might not have come," she responded with a sigh. "Such a woman as I am."
"Such a woman as you are! What do you mean?"
"Well, I mean that it wouldn't be surprising if people didn't keep their word to me."
He felt a bitter resentment against this sort of self-abasement.
"I must beg you, Lizzie," he said, "to drop this false humility. You are the wife of Ulrich von Kletzingk. As such, you have the right to claim respect, the highest respect from me and every one else. And who doesn't ..."