"For you know, Kitty pet, I've always longed so awfully to see some really nice person, you know, who wouldn't go and save my life and bother me. Now he doesn't seem a bit like proposing. I do hope he won't. Don't you, Kitty dearest? It's so much nicer not to propose. It's so horrid when they go and propose. And then, you know, I've had so much of that sort of thing. So, Kitty, I think he's really the nicest person that I ever saw, and I really think I'm beginning to like him."
Far different from these were the conversations which Mrs. Willoughby had with Ethel. She was perfectly familiar with Ethel's story. It had been confided to her long ago. She alone knew why it was that Ethel had walked untouched through crowds of admirers. The terrible story of her rescue was memorable to her for other reasons; and the one who had taken the prominent part in that rescue could not be without interest for her.
"There is no use, Kitty—no use in talking about it any more," said Ethel one day, after Mrs. Willoughby had been urging her to show herself. "I can not. I will not. He has forgotten me utterly."
"Perhaps he has no idea that you are here. He has never seen you."
"Has he not been in Naples as long as we have? He must have seen me in the streets. He saw Minnie."
"Do you think it likely that he would come to this house and slight you? If he had forgotten you he would not come here."
"Oh yes, he would. He comes to see Minnie. He knows I am here, of course. He doesn't care one atom whether I make my appearance or not. He doesn't even give me a thought. It's so long since that time that he has forgotten even my existence. He has been all over the world since then, and has had a hundred adventures. I have been living quietly, cherishing the remembrance of that one thing."
"Ethel, is it not worth trying? Go down and try him."
"I can not bear it. I can not look at him. I lose all self-command when he is near. I should make a fool of myself. He would look at me with a smile of pity. Could I endure that? No, Kitty; my weakness must never be known to him."
"Oh, Ethel, how I wish you could try it!"