“Are you very, very desirous of knowing how the case stands between myself and Master Reginald Trevor?”
“I am, indeed. And when you’ve told me, I’ll give you the reason.”
“On that condition I’ll tell you. He is nothing to me more than any other man. And when I add that no other man is anything either, you’ll understand me.”
“But, sister dear, do you mean to say you love no one?”
“I mean to say that—flat.”
“And never have?”
“That’s a queer question to be asked; above all by you, you who so often preach the virtue of constancy, crying it into my ears! If I ever had loved man, I think I should love him still. But as it chances, I don’t quite comprehend what the sensation is; never having experienced it. And more, I don’t wish to; that is, if it were to affect me as it seems to do you.”
“What do you mean, Vaga?” asked the more sage sister, bristling up at the innuendo. “Love affect me! You’re only fancying! Nothing of the sort, I assure you.”
“Oh! yes; much of the sort; though you might not yourself perceive it. Everybody else does, at least I do—have for a very long time—ever since he went off to the wars.”
“What he?”