“You mean that, otherwise, there would be no buried treasure!” she exclaimed. “Of course!—how stupid! And with all that money, the Duvals 211 might have gone away from Hampton—might have experienced other conditions. Colonel Duval might never have met your father—you might have never come to Clarendon.—My goodness! Where does it end?”
“In the realm of pure conjecture,” he answered. “It is idle to theorize on the might-have-beens, or what might-have-happened if the what-did-happen hadn’t happened. Dismiss it, at least, for this evening. You asked what I was doing for three weeks at Annapolis, and I have consumed a great while in answering—let us talk of something else. What have you been doing in those three weeks?”
“Nothing! A little Bridge, a few riding parties, some sails on the Bay, with an occasional homily by Miss Erskine, when she had me cornered, and I couldn’t get away. Then is when I learned what a deep impression you had made!” she laughed.
“We both were learning, it seems,” he replied.
She looked at him, inquiringly.
“I don’t quite understand,” she said.
“You made an impression, also—of course, that’s to be expected, but this impression is much more than the ordinary kind!”
“Merci, Monsieur,” she scoffed.
“No, it isn’t merci, it’s a fact. And he is a mighty good fellow on whom to make an impression.”
“You mean, Mr.—Macloud?”