Easton gave a little sigh. “And that you’re not prepared to offer,” he said, with a miserable smile.
“Why, Easton!” exclaimed the other. “Isn’t this rather a new line for you? Since when have you wanted my approval of any course you were to take? You used to make up your mind to a thing and do it, and then ask my approval.”
“Approval isn’t the question, quite,” said Easton, nettled. “There’s nothing to approve or to disapprove.”
“I admit the word’s clumsy,” answered Gilbert, shortly.
Easton said nothing for a little while, and then he spoke soberly: “I don’t want to force any confidence on you, Gilbert; and after what’s passed I know it’s natural for you to shrink from having anything to do with this affair of mine; it is completely my own, as you say. But I can’t have things remain as they are in your mind in regard to—to Mrs. Farrell. You know that I’m in love with her; it’s no secret; I wouldn’t mind shouting it from the housetop, even if she had refused me a hundred times. But she hasn’t. I have told her that I love her; and she hasn’t forbidden me; I don’t know whether she has warranted me in hoping, or not; but she has imposed conditions on my speaking to her again, and that is something.”
He glanced appealingly at Gilbert, who sat up and confronted him. “Easton,” he said, with an indefinable air of uncandor, “we never spoke of Mrs. Farrell together but once, and then I said things which, if I could have supposed you were going to take her so seriously, I wouldn’t have said. You know that.”
“Yes, I know that, Gilbert,” answered Easton, affectionately.
“Well; and now what do you want me to say? You must let me hold my tongue. It’s the only way. I will respect you in whatever you do. As for the lady who may some day forbid you to bring me to dinner any more, the least said is the soonest mended.”
“Yes; but you are very unjust to her.” The words seemed to have escaped from Easton, who looked a trifle alarmed after speaking them.
“Unjust? Unjust! You’re right; I revise my opinion; I think I didn’t do her justice.”