"Or if you were to ask her!"
But immediately Lucinda repented her resentment of what she had hastily taken to be an attempt to becloud impatience with ill-timed levity. For Lynn treated her to the reproof of a sulky silence, in which he persisted till she felt constrained, in self-justification, to adopt the very tone that had vexed her.
"Or don't you think that would be a good idea, Lynn?"
The man shifted in his corner till he sat half-facing her, his manner seriously defensive.
"Look here, Linda! I've known a long time you suspected there was something between this Marquis girl and me—or had been——"
"Wait a minute, Lynn: I may be stupid, women in love usually are, they say; but that thought never crossed my mind before the moment when, back there in the restaurant, I saw you didn't want me to know you'd seen her."
"Then it must have been my conscience, I guess." Lynn fumbled for and found her hand beneath the rug that covered their knees. "You see——"
"Oh, I see!" Lucinda snapped, and drew her hand away.
"No, you don't——"
"But I do, Lynn: and I'm quite reasonable about it. Only, I presume, I needed this to make me understand the kind of man I'd given my heart to."