“Why—on that evening. When I found your mother wasn’t in, I half turned away, but after hesitating, decided to wait. And then, when I found you two in the morning room, I decided that I would leave you, and go and read in the library. I was just about to say so, when you told me to sit down by you on the sofa. That led to our coming off here together, and really finding out about each other. Of course that was equivalent to my falling desperately in love.”
“But you could have done that at home,” laughed Frances, merrily.
“No, I should have come off here, and some other man would have won you.”
“Champney! I never could love any one but you.”
Champney swallowed the absurd statement rapturously. “That’s just like the angel that you are,” he declared.
“But I knew you had something to do with our coming,” asserted Frances, “though you did deny it.”
“No; like a consummate donkey, I didn’t want to be bothered with you. Conceive of it, dear one, that I could ever think you a bother!”
“You didn’t know me,” laughed Frances happily, and with no intention of vanity.
“No, I should think not. I wanted your father to take you. But I shall never want any one else to do that in the future.”
“But why did you want me to go to Europe, if it wasn’t to be with me?”