She turned a startled face to me.
“You killed him? Why?”
“He laughed at me because I was unhappy,” said I.
“Through me?”
“Yes; through you. But that’s neither here nor there. We were not discussing the death of Polyphemus. We were talking about being philosophers, and you said that as a philosopher you hated everything and everybody except me. Why do you exclude me, Carlotta?”
We were riding so near together that my leg rubbed her saddle-girth. I looked hard at her. She turned away her head and put the pantomime parasol between us. I heard a little choking sob.
“Let us get off—and sit down a little—I want to cry.
“The end of all feminine philosophy,” I said, somewhat brutally. “No. It’s getting late. That’s only Mogador in front of us. Let us go to it.”
Carlotta shifted her parasol quickly.
“What has happened to you, Seer Marcous? You have never spoken to me like that before.”