“Pray think it is. Only imagine it is there, and soon it will be.”
She felt that the time was at hand to strike the blow.
“If I could be perfectly sure you spoke in earnest,” she said, seeming to search his countenance for testimony.
“In earnest!” he echoed. “Great heavens, what evidence do you want? If there is an aspect of love I do not have, tell me, and I shall put it on.”
“Yes, you are experienced in putting on the aspects of love.”
“Oh, you well know I have no reason now for declaring a love I don’t feel. If you could be sure I spoke in earnest, you said,—what then? Tell me, and I shall find a way to convince you I am in earnest.”
“Convince me first.”
“‘Convince me,’ you say. And I say, ‘Be convinced.’ By the Lord, never was so great a sceptic! Is not your sense of your own charms sufficient to convince you of their effect?”
“Mere words!”