"Don't you care to know?"
"Of course I care to know."
"Yet, exercising all your marvellous masculine self-control, you nobly refuse to ask?"
"I'm afraid to," he said, laughing; "I'm horribly afraid of you."
She considered him with clear, unsmiling eyes.
"Coward!" she said calmly.
He nodded his head, laughing still. "I know it; I almost lost you by saying 'Calypso' a moment ago and I'm taking no more risks."
"Am I to infer that you expect to recover me after this?"
And, as he made no answer: "You dare not admit that you hope to see me again. You are horribly afraid of me—even if I have defied convention and your opinions and have graciously overlooked your impertinence. In spite of all this you are still afraid of me. Are you?"
"Yes," he said; "as much as I naturally ought to be."