“Do you mean to be insulting?”
“Put such an idea instantly out of your mind.” There was stern command in his eyes and voice, and Janet shrank back, frightened by the storm she had provoked. “I should never think of insulting you, I love you too deeply,” his tones vibrated with feeling. “I respect you too highly—but I am jealous, bitterly jealous. I, and I alone, must rule your heart and mind. ‘Thou shalt have no other god but me’!”
“Don’t blaspheme!” She cringed back in her chair, and covered her ears with her shaking fingers. “Chichester, Chichester, I have given you no cause for jealousy.”
“Perhaps not intentionally,” he admitted, more quietly. “But for my comfort, you see too much of Tom Nichols.”
“You are entirely mistaken. I haven’t seen him for some time.”
“How about your motor ride with him on Christmas Day?” She colored in spite of herself.
“How did you hear of it?” she demanded.
“News travels fast when a man boasts....”
“I don’t believe it,” she broke in vehemently. “Tom Nichols isn’t that sort. He would keep his word to me to say nothing about it.”
“Ah, then your intimacy has reached the stage of mutual secrets!” Barnard’s brow darkened. “Now, once for all this platonic friendship,” with biting sarcasm, “must stop. As your fiancé, I forbid you to have anything further to do with him.”