‘I—I think we’d better go back,’ she stammered. ‘This dance is almost over, and——’
‘We won’t go back just yet,’ he returned. ‘I want to talk to you. You owe me a few moments, Marcia. Come here and sit down and listen to what I have to say.’
He turned into the little circle by the fountain and motioned toward a garden seat. Marcia dropped limply upon it and looked at him with an air of pleading. There was no circumlocution; both knew that the time had come when everything must be said, and Paul went to the point.
‘Well, Marcia, are you going to marry me?’
Marcia sat opening and shutting her fan nervously, trying to frame an answer that would not hurt him.
‘I’ve been patient; I haven’t bothered you. You surely ought to know your own mind now. You’ve had a month—it hasn’t been exactly a happy month for me. Tell me, please, Marcia. Don’t keep me waiting any longer.’
‘Oh, Paul!’ she said, looking back with half-frightened eyes. ‘It’s all a mistake.’
‘A mistake! What do you mean? Marcia, I trusted you. You can’t throw me over now. Tell me quickly!’
‘Forgive me, Paul,’ she faltered miserably. ‘I—I was mistaken. I thought, that day in the cloister——’
He realized that, somehow, she was slipping away from him and that he must fight to get her back. He bent toward her and took her hand, with his glowing, eager face close to hers, his words coming so fast that he fairly stuttered.