"Still of a pretty wit." She spoke sharply, but her eyes were not without kindness for him. "Danger, Mr. Cary Scott! Danger!"
He did not pretend to misunderstand. "Let me assure you that I am not wholly without principle, Miss Fentriss."
"You? Granted. But what of Pat? Has my scapegrace little witch of a niece any principles whatever? I doubt it."
So, after all, he had misunderstood. "Are you, then, warning me of danger to myself? C'est à rire, n'est-ce pas?"
"It is not to laugh at all. I am serious. I have been watching you this evening when you were with Pat and when you were only following her with your eyes. Your expression is not always guarded, if one has learned to read the human face."
He flushed. Then there came upon him the reckless desire to ease his soul of the secret which filled it. She had invited it, and he instinctively knew that to this serene, poised, self-sufficing, sage woman of the world he could speak in the assurance of sympathy and without fear of incomprehension or betrayal.
"It's true," he said beneath his breath. "I love her. I love her as I never dreamed it possible to love."
"And you've told her so." He made no reply. "I know you have because I know Pat. She's as greedy as she is shrewd; she'd know and she'd never be happy until she'd had it out of you. And then she'd be sorry and blame you for speaking."
"Yes. I've told her," he muttered.