I started, for this phase of the matter had not presented itself to my mind.
"He doesn't seem to be," I answered, with as much nonchalance as I could muster. "Of course every one can see that they both stand in awe of him; but I thought that must be because he is so extraordinarily—clever."
She laughed, then she looked at me more seriously.
"If it were only his cleverness they would not be hypocritical with him. And tyrants do breed hypocrites."
"Not unless there is hypocritical material—to start out with."
"I—don't know! If you loved a tyrant, and desired above everything else to please him, it might mean the ultimate ruin of even your frank character."
"I couldn't love a tyrant," I argued.
"You might not recognize the tyrant in him—until after you had married him," she said.
The same uneasy feeling that again came over me when I discussed his political prospects took possession of me then, and I started to ask her frankly what she had in mind, when Evelyn came up and said that her mother wanted Cousin Eunice to come and see her with the wrap on. So she passed on back to the dressing-room to help decide the momentous question, while Evelyn and I sat there and discussed the good points of the coat she had just bought.
Ann Lisbeth was sweet and wholesome when I met her an hour or two later—an admirable antidote to the disagreeable feeling I had brought away from the shops.