Margaret was not so steeped in sorrows but she could mark this evasion of a plain statement with amusement.
Ford, staring at her intently, clicked with impatience.
"Well, then," he said in the tone of one who is goaded to extreme lengths; "well then, Miss—er—Margaret—" he paused, seemingly struck by a pleasant flavor in the name as he spoke it—"Margaret," he repeated, less urgently; "I 'm hanged if I know how to say it, but—I love you."
There was an appreciable interval while they remained gazing at each other, he breathless and discomposed, she grave and unresponding.
"Do you?" she said at last. "But—"
"I do," he urged. "On my soul, I do. Margaret, it 's true. I 've been—loving—you for a long time. I thought perhaps you might care a little, too, sometimes, and I 'd have told you if it was n't for this chest of mine. That 's what I meant when you said you were going away and I asked you to stay. I thought you understood then."
"I did understand," she replied, and sat thoughtful.
She wondered vaguely at the apathy that mastered her and would not suffer her to feel even a thrill. Some virtue had departed out of her and drawn with it the whole liveliness of her mind and spirit, so that what remained was mere deadness. She knew, in some subconscious and uninspiring manner, that Ford was what he had always been, with passion added to him; he was waiting in a tension of suspense for her to answer, with his thin face eager and glowing. It should have moved her with compassion and liking for the stubborn, faithful, upright soul she knew him to be. But the letter, the confident approaches of the Punchinello policeman, and even Mrs. Jakes' ill-restrained joy in bidding her leave the place, had been so many blows upon her function of susceptibility. The accumulation of them had a little stunned her, and she was not yet restored.
Ford saw her lips hesitate before she spoke, and his heart beat more quickly.
She looked up at him uncertainly and made a movement with her shoulders like a shrug.