‘I am sorry to hear that.’
‘Sorry!... Why?’
‘Because I am not going to have him,’ was the half-petulant, half-sobbing answer.
‘O Pansy, what is this?’ exclaimed Madge astonished, puzzled and regretful. ‘When we last spoke about him, you made me believe that you liked him very much, and that you only hesitated because you were afraid your father would not be pleased.’
‘And I do like him—like him so much, that it upsets me to put him out or trouble him. But I’m not going to have him, and I’ve told him so. He was asking me just before you came, and—and I told him.’
There was real distress in voice and look; but there was an under-current of sulky defiance, as if being conscious that she had not behaved well to the man, she was eager to defend herself, and finding no ready way of doing it, was angry with herself whilst ready to anticipate blame.
Madge’s expression of astonishment changed to one of grave concern, although Pansy’s confession of anxiety to spare Caleb suggested that there was nothing worse to apprehend than some misunderstanding between the lovers, which would be put right as soon as the girl got over her excitement. So she proceeded quietly to bandage the injured hand, without speaking for several minutes. Pansy was evidently unhappy; the silence of her friend was a more severe rebuke than any words of blame could have been. She could endure it no longer.
‘Oh, what shall I do?’ she burst out; ‘you are vexed with me now, like him.’
‘You must not think that, Pansy. I am very much grieved to see you in such a state as this; but I am sure it only needs a little forbearance on your part to put everything right again. There is nothing uncommon in a little tiff between lovers, and you will soon get over it. I will answer for Caleb that he will be ready to make it up as soon as you speak a kind word to him.’
‘But I can’t speak the word he wants, for I am not to have him.’