"It isn't only that," he muttered sullenly. "It's the same old thing. Hiding behind your skirts. I can't bear it. Why, suppose I were found here?"
All at once they seemed completely divided. "Oh, you make me so angry!" she said helplessly. "Thinking about what people would say? You think more of what people say than you do of me! What have you and I got to do with what people say?"
"You're not quite fair to me," he said.
The note of quiet stubbornness terrified her. Here was a force she could not gauge. "Oh, we must not quarrel!" she murmured with a catch in her breath ... "Oh, Don, I love you so!"
"Oh my Pen!" he murmured gathering her in his arms again.
There was a blessed peaceful interlude.
After awhile she murmured in a small voice: "Then you will stay here until we can think up something else?"
But the quiet stubbornness was unaltered. "I won't promise anything. I must be free to decide."
"But Don! After all the trouble I have had to get you here! You're in my castle, and I must know where I have you. Mustn't you let me decide for the time being?"
"That's just the rub," he said ruefully. "You're so bossy, Pen. If you had me here right under your thumb I wouldn't be able to call my soul my own."