"Bless me, what a Solomon you will become, if you persevere in your labors! But your stoicism surprises me. Can it be possible that Marian Lindsay's load-stars failed in attraction?"
"Nonsense! I have said nothing of Marian Lindsay or her load-stars, as you are pleased to call them. Her eyes are not black, nor are they those I spoke of."
"What, a new attraction! Well, I see that I must relinquish the task of keeping you steady. I had hopes, when I prudently endeavored to prevent your falling in love with me, (which you cannot deny you had more than half a mind to do,) by directing your amorous disposition towards a proper object, that your fancy would endure at least a month or two. Do you not now perceive what a folly I should have been guilty of, had I suffered you to dangle, as you wished, at my apron string?"
"I do indeed. Still, I may say with honest Jack Falstaff, 'ere I knew thee, I knew nothing.'"
"Yes," said she, "and I can finish the sentence with equal truth—'and now art thou little better than one of the wicked.' But I deny your declaration, for you have confessed to the truth of your intrigues with the little Canadian milliner, and the blue eyed Irlandaise."
"I admit it; but those were unsophisticated flirtations."
"Unsophisticated! Mercy on us!"
"Oh yes," said Selden, "and he stoutly denies having ever sighed to you, Fenella; and talks a deal of nonsense about friendship, as though such a feeling ever existed between a lad of nineteen and a lady under twenty-five."
"Upon that subject," replied Fenella, "we can at least keep our own counsel."
"Come, Cleaveland," said I, "we are bound in the same direction. I have a few words to say to you, and if you are at leisure we will walk."