“But it does not make me unhappy not to be contented—”
“Say it, please; or—do you desire me to be unhappy?”
Her small, smooth hands lying between his, they stood confronting one another in the golden light. She might easily have brought the matter to an end; and why she did not, she knew no more than a kitten waking to consciousness under its first caress.
“Say it,” she repeated, laughing uncertainly back into his smiling eyes of a boy.
“Say what?”
“That you are contented.”
“I can't.”
“Mr. Siward, it is unkind, it is shameless—”
“I know it; I am that sort.”
“Then I am sorry for you. Look at that!” turning her left hand in his so that the jewel on the third finger caught the light.