May was silent, and hung down her head.
“Come, May, you’ve never had any secrets from me. Surely you’re not going to begin now—on the eve of my departure to a foreign land?”
“I would rather not talk about him at all,” said the girl, looking up entreatingly.
But Shank looked down upon her sternly. He had assumed the parental rôle. “May, there is something in this that you ought not to conceal. I have a right to know it, as your brother—your protector.”
Innocent though May was, she could not repress a faint smile at the idea of a protector who had been little else than a cause of anxiety in the past, and was now about to leave her to look after herself, probably for years to come. But she answered frankly, while another and a deeper blush overspread her face—
“I did not mean to speak of it, Shank, as you knew nothing, and I had hoped would never know anything about it, but since you insist, I must tell you that—that Mr Ritson, I’m afraid, loves me at least he—”
“Afraid! loves you! How do you know?” interrupted Shank quickly.
“Well, he said so—the last time we met.”
“The rascal! Had he the audacity to ask you to marry him?—him—a beggar, without a sixpence except what his father gives him?”
“No, Shank, I would not let him get the length of that. I told him I was too young to—to think about such matters at all, and said that he must not speak to me again in such a way. But I was so surprised, flurried, and distressed, that I don’t clearly remember what I said.”