Her attention followed the bronzed expressive face, so bold in outline, so delicate in detail, with a growing fascination.
'It seems to me you hate more than you love.'
He considered it.
'Quite possible. It isn't an engaging world. But I don't hate readily—I hate slowly and by degrees. If anybody offends me, for instance, at first I hardly feel it,—it doesn't seem to matter at all. Then it grows in my mind gradually, it becomes a weight—a burning fire—and drives everything else out. I hate the men, for instance, that I hated last year in England, much worse now than I did then!'
She bit her lip, but could not help the broadening smile, to which his own responded.
'Do you take any interest, Miss Foster, in what happened to me last year?'
'I often wonder whether you regret it,' she said, rather shyly. 'Wasn't it—a great pity?'
'Not at all,' he said peremptorily; 'I shall recover all I let slip.'
She did not reply. But the smile still trembled on her lips, while she copied his favourite trick in stripping the leaves from a spray of box.
'You don't believe that?'