"Yes," he said with a wistful touch, "you said you liked me once, when you thought I was something else."
"What was that?" she inquired naively.
"A rich chap; a millionaire."
"Well, aren't you?" she demanded.
"Not exactly," he answered rather lugubriously. "That dream's over. We've been playing a queer game, but it has come to an end sooner than I expected. I'm a poor devil again now, and there's all about it."
For a moment Ulrica's violet eyes rested on him sympathetically. Then they looked away and seemed to be interested in the distant figure of Mr. Treacher who was slouching across the landscape.
"If people are poor," she said presently in a low voice from which all feeling was rigidly excluded, "it doesn't make any difference with me, when I like them."
Peckover jumped up. He could do no less. "Ulrica," he said and his voice trembled, "you like me? Yes, you said you did once. But I can't hold you to that for I was a regular fraud when I got you to say it."
Miss Buffkin gave a little sigh, and with a lingering glance at the uninteresting Mr. Treacher, turned towards the stairway. "All right," she said with an affectation of indifference. "I think I hear some one climbing after us."
The steps were steep and awkward. He had to take her hand, and at the touch his resolution (more honourable than many a better-bred man would have formed) gave way. "Ulrica," he said with a diffident tremor, "you couldn't care for a little nobody like me?"