"Oh, but you are making too much of all that," he replied, and then, with an invalid's abruptness, he asked, "Where's your talisman?"
She looked down at her watch chain. "I gave it to Mr. Scarlett, he liked it," she said, with a guilty remembrance of Reynold among the brambles. "But you haven't answered me, Mr. Harding."
Her pleading was persistent, like a child's. She was childishly intent on the very word she wanted. She remembered how her uncle had laughed as she walked home after that first encounter with young Harding. "And you saw him roll into the ditch—Barbara, the poor fellow must hate you like poison!" No, he must not! It was the word she could not bear, it was only the word she knew.
"Nonsense!" he said, moving his head uneasily, "Let bygones be bygones. We can't alter the past. We are going different ways—go yours, and let me go mine in peace."
It was a harsh answer, but the frown which accompanied it betrayed irresolution as well as anger.
"I can't go so," Barbara pleaded, emboldened by this sign of possible yielding. "I never meant to do any harm. Say you are not angry—only one word—and then I'll go."
"I know you will." He laid his lean hands on the arms of his chair, and drew himself up. "Well," he said, "have it your own way—why not? What is it that I am to say?"
"Say," she began eagerly, and then checked herself. She would not ask too much. "Say only that you don't hate me," she entreated, fixing her eyes intently on his face.
"I love you, Barbara."