“No,” said he; “I am trying to get a special report. I saw Dr. Bynum looking at you over his spectacles yesterday.”
Miss Sophie tried to show that this suggestion was an irritating one, but she failed, and then fell to laughing.
“I never knew I was so full of humor before,” said Francis Underwood, by way of comment.
“And I never knew you could be so foolish—to me,” said Miss Sophie, still laughing. “What is Dr. Bynum to me?”
“Not having his spectacles to look over, how do I know?”
“But,” persisted Miss Sophie, “you need no spectacles to look at Mildred. I have seen you looking at her through your fingers.”
“And what was she doing?” inquired Underwood, coloring in the most surprising way.
“Oh,” said Miss Sophie, “she was pretending not to notice it; but I can sit with my back to you both and tell by the tone of her voice when this and that thing is going on.”
“This, then, is courtship,” said Underwood.