“It’s not that!” he cried incoherently. “My dear girl, you mustn’t think I don’t like it—I like it very much. But it isn’t the thing—for a woman to kiss a man’s hand, I mean. It ought to be the other way about.”
“Not among us, lord,” she replied, gently but firmly. “But I will try to learn the ways of your people. And this, my offending you when I desire so much to please you, makes it easier for me to say what I wished to ask. Since I am now your wife, and it would grieve me to disgrace you before the great ones of your land, will you grant me a time in which I may study the things of Europe, and learn to talk about them?”
“It sounds a good idea,” said Armitage, irresistibly amused by the businesslike way in which she spoke. “But what exactly would you wish to study?”
“Lord, I am very ignorant. I can spin and weave and sew and embroider, and cook—I made all the sweetmeats for the feast to-day—loukoumi and almond-milk and all——” she paused.
“And very good they were,” said the bridegroom heartily.
“But I know nothing of the things European ladies do. I cannot write, nor read—save a very little—I can speak neither French nor English. Ah, lord!” she clasped her hands entreatingly, “take me to the Lady Zoe, and let her teach me. Indeed I will do my best to learn from her, to learn to be like her. And when you come back in two or three years——”
“That is quite out of the question,” said Armitage, with great firmness. “A year at the very outside.”
“As you will, lord. I must learn all the harder. But truly you need not fear that the Lady Zoe’s kindness will be wasted, as when I was with her before.”
“That certainly makes the plan more promising,” said Armitage gravely. “Then when I come back, you promise that you will be exactly like the Lady Zoe?”
“Yes, lord, as far as I can,” very meekly.