Now somehow, he did not care to begin. Was Leo in one of her moods? If so it was no use thinking of anything else; he knew by experience what those moods were. Could he bring her round? Sometimes he could, sometimes not.
Was she really pleased to see him back, or—? He could not endure that "or?"
In short, the whole magnificent house of cards wherewith our young man had so pleased himself an hour before, showed now a flimsy shanty not worth a moment's preservation; and stripped of all importance, reduced to insignificance, afraid of his own voice, he slunk along by Leonore's side.
"Why don't you speak?"—she flung at him at last.
"You—you are so strange!" He faltered, then tried to rally. "What's the matter, Leo? Something is, I'm sure. You might tell me. You know I'm always sorry when you are, and——"
"What makes you think I am?" But she spoke more gently, and emboldened, he proceeded:—
"You did look pleased at first, but directly I spoke, you seemed to fly off at a tangent. I suppose I said something rotten, I often do—but you might have known I didn't mean it."
"It was not what you said." She paused.
"What was it then?"
"You look—every one looks—so happy and content—so bursting with prosperity, so supremely filled with—oh, can't you see, can't you see, that I'm alone and miserable, and different? When you pretended to admire me just now——"