But he only smirked at her.
"Look here, little girl," he said, "suppose you begin to make your eyes behave, and come down to actualities. You know what I want; I know what you want. We've been wasting time all summer. I'm no fool; neither are you, as you show by selecting this nice, little nook for a good, sensible talk."
She only stared at him, thinking he had gone mad, and he laughed and twirled his mustache.
"Nix for the baby stare," he said reprovingly. "I tell you I know what a girl like you wants—privacy, discretion, and the usual ... And I've got it, little girl—wads of it!"
The grotesqueness of the dream seemed to make her stupid; she tried to find some sense and reason in what this man was saying to her, strove to comprehend him, his visit, his words.
"Are you asking me to—marry you," she said, confused.
"Marry you!" he repeated, his expressive features suddenly blank, then jocular again.
"Then—what——"
And, suddenly staring into the sinister smirk, she comprehended, and turned ashy white.
Even he could not mistake the genuineness of that white horror.