Guy noticed the eyes then, and thought them very bright and handsome for brown, but not as handsome as if they had been blue, for Lucy Atherstone’s were blue; and as he thought of her he was glad she was not obliged to sit there in that doctor’s office, and be questioned by him or any other man. “Of course, of course,” he said, “if your employers are satisfied it is nothing to me, only I had associated teaching with women much older than yourself. What is logic, Miss Clyde?”
The abruptness with which he put the question startled Madeline to such a degree that she could not positively tell whether she had ever heard that word before, much less could she recall its meaning, and so she answered frankly, “I don’t know.”
A girl who did not know what logic was did not know much, in Guy’s estimation, but it would not do to stop here, and so he asked her next how many cases there were in Latin!
Maddy felt the hot blood tingling to her very finger tips, for the examination had taken a course widely different from her ideas of what it would probably be. She had never looked inside a Latin grammar, and again her truthful “I don’t know, sir,” fell on Guy’s ear, but this time there was a half despairing tone in the young voice, usually so hopeful.
“Perhaps then you can conjugate the verb amo,” Guy said, his manner indicating the doubt he was beginning to feel as to her qualifications.
Maddy knew what conjugate meant, but that verb amo, what could it mean? and had she ever heard it before? Mr. Remington was waiting for her, she must say something, and with a gasp she began: “I amo, thou amoest, he amoes. Plural: We amo, ye or you amo, they amo.”
Guy looked at her aghast for a single moment, and then a comical smile broke all over his face, telling poor Maddy plainer than words could have done, that she had made a most ridiculous mistake.
“Oh, sir,” she cried, her eyes wearing the look of the frightened hare, “it is not right. I don’t know what it means. Tell me, teach me. What does amo mean?”
To most men it would not have seemed a very disagreeable task, teaching young Madeline Clyde what amo meant, and some such idea flitted across Guy’s mind, as he thought how pretty and bright was the eager face upturned to his, the pure white forehead, suffused with a faint flush, the cheeks a crimson hue, and the pale lips parted slightly as Maddy appealed to him for the definition of amo.
“It is a Latin verb, and means to love,” Guy said, with an emphasis on the last word, which would have made Maddy blush had she been less anxious and frightened.