“A great burden,” he repeated frigidly. “Surely you forget yourself, Miss Delavigne.”
“No, no,” she replied with animation. “Do not be vexed with me, Mr. Armour; I am just beginning to understand things. You know that I have no father and mother. When I was a little girl away across the sea, and the other children went home for their holidays, I used to cry to think that I had no home. When I got older I found out from your letters that you did not wish me to come. I was surprised that you at last sent for me, but yet delighted, for I thought, even if the Armours do not care for me I shall be in my native land, I shall never leave it; yet, yet——”
She paused for an instant and seemed to be struggling with some emotion. Mr. Armour raised his heavy eyelids just long enough to glance at her, then dropped them again. His eyes carried the picture to the reddish-brown tiles of the hearth—the pretty graceful figure of the half girl, half woman, before him, her little foreign gestures, the alluring softness of her dark eyes. Yet the picture possessed no attraction for him. It only appealed slightly to his half-deadened sensibilities. He was doing wrong to dislike her so intensely. He must keep his feelings under better control.
“Well,” he said less coldly, “you were going to say something else.”
“I was going to say,” remarked Vivienne, a bright impatient color coming and going in her cheeks, “that one cannot live on patriotism. I thought that I would not miss my friends—the people who have been good to me. I find that I do. In this house I feel that I am an intruder——”
“And the Macartneys adore you,” he said, a steely gleam of amusement coming into his eyes, “and consequently you wish to be with them.”
“That is a slight exaggeration,” said Vivienne composedly; “yet we will let it pass. With your permission I will marry Captain Macartney.”
“Suppose I withhold my permission.”
Vivienne glanced keenly at him. Was this man of marble capable of a jest? Yes, he was. “If you do,” she said coolly, “I will run away.” Then she laughed with the ease and gayety of girlhood and Mr. Armour watching her smiled gravely.
“I suppose the Macartneys have been much touched by your stories of our cruel treatment of you,” he said sarcastically.