"Don't say 'must not' to me, if you please!" she flung back; but when she reached the door she turned and said calmly, though her eyes still blazed:
"I suppose it is not necessary for me to ask that you consider what I have said to you confidential."
"It is quite unnecessary," I said, not knowing whether I loved or pitied her most; and my wits were busy trying to devise means of saving her the heartache her ignorance held in store for her.
She called to Sister Margaret in her brightest tone, and when I had walked with them to St. Agatha's gate she bade me good-by with quite as demure and Christian an air as the Sister herself.
CHAPTER XX
THE TOUCH OF DISHONOR
Give me a staff of honour for mine age.
—Titus Andronicus.
I was meditating my course over a cheerless luncheon when Gillespie was announced. He lounged into the dining-room, drew his chair to the table and covered a biscuit with camembert with his usual inscrutable air.
"I think it is better," he said deliberatingly, "to be an ass than a fool. Have you any views on the subject?"