He was holding her hands tightly as he spoke, and Mabel trembled under the rush of his words. Was she going to faint, or what was the meaning of that wild throbbing at her heart? Clearly she must act decisively and at once, or this tempestuous young man would think he had taken her by storm. She summoned hastily the remnants of her pride.
“Please go and sit down over there,” she said, freeing her hands from his grasp. “How can I think properly when you are towering over me like that?” Fitz did not offer to move, and by way of redressing the inequality, she rose also, supporting herself by laying a shaking hand upon the writing-table. “I am so very sorry and—and surprised about this. I had no idea——”
“None?” he asked.
“I mean I never thought it would go as far as this—that you would be so persistent—so much in earnest.”
“A new light on the matter, evidently.” As she grew more agitated, Fitz had become calmer.
“Because it’s impossible, you know.”
“Excuse me, I don’t know anything of the kind.”
“You are a great deal younger than I am, for one thing.”
“Barely three years, and it’s a fault that will mend.”
“No, it won’t. As you get older, I shall get old faster, and if there is a thing I detest, it is to see a young man with an elderly wife. I could not endure to feel that I was growing old while you were still in the prime of life. You would hate it yourself, too, and you would leave off caring for me, and we should both be miserable.”