Blanche was very pale. The horses took five steps while there was silence. Then:
“It’s sweet of you to say that.” The girl’s voice was shaken. “But you know, Walter, as she does, I’m not her kind.”
“But I don’t want you to be!”
“Don’t you, Walter?” She looked at him earnestly. “And I’m not your kind, either. I mean, I’m not like the women you’ve known. She’s made me feel that—your sister. It’s one reason why I hate her. Oh, I do!” She nodded at him. “You may as well know that. She makes me see what I’ve missed—little things I thought didn’t matter. But now——”
“But, child,” he interrupted, exasperated, manlike, with her self-depreciations, “those little things don’t count! It isn’t that. But if you loved me——”
“If I loved you?” She turned large, astonished eyes on him.
“Well, you wouldn’t take things from Blair Hemming. I won’t stand it,” he broke out. “He was talking about you, Blanche.”
“What did he say?”
“That makes no difference. A woman can’t afford to be talked about in any way. She can’t know a man in such a way.”
“In what way?” The girl was breathless.