“I don’t think I am,” he replied. “I was wondering precisely where I came in?”
“You come in here,” she laughed, with halting mirth; “you’re the oracle; you roll out the future in a hollow voice; you say what you think.”
He shook his head.
“No, I forgot,” she ran on, “you never do; you say what you think some one else will think of what you wouldn’t say if you thought it; isn’t that it? You explained it to me once, but it wasn’t clear. Well, say that! Say something! You’ve known Veynes longer than I have; say he’s not good enough for me!”
“Oh, that’s understood,” he murmured.
“By Veynes?”
“By Veynes just at present, probably. I meant by you and me.”
“Oh, you!” she flouted. “You mightn’t think yourself good enough.”
It was a curious challenge for a man’s matrimonial amen. The woman thirsting for love and eager to drink it; the man thirsty and afraid. She did not see the sudden change in his eyes, as though a flame went through them. She was looking the other way. But she heard the parry of his low “I should not” to her thrust. It pierced like the white pinch of frost, it ran cold even into her voice.
“Ah, you’re too modest,” she rallied, so briskly that he did not notice the shiver in her throat. “Besides, you’re rather cowed by my frock; but how about the family?”