“I can only repeat,” said she, “that I am very sorry it has happened. I will not say so again: for one apology is enough, when you are sincere. Papa was too emphatic. He fully impressed me with the idea that a marriage between us was settled, and--and I was _determined_ not to be married in such an off-hand way.” And then a bright blush glowed in those cheeks, which, a few hours before, I could have sworn were incapable of blushing; she tried to smile, but looked terribly confused and nervous. “You must have a great deal of courage to handle a pistol as you do,” said I, willing to relieve her by changing the subject. “All the girls I have known would rather play with a black beetle than gunpowder.” “I began to shoot long before I heard you were coming,” she answered, quickly. “Yes, I know. Your father says you are a capital shot.” “I believe I am. You will think the pastime very unfeminine; but it is a caprice of mine, and papa is very indulgent.” “You are also a very courageous rider, I hear.” “There are very few horses I should fear to mount.” “And now, Theresa, will you confess that your favourite author is not the ‘Family Herald?’” She laughed outright at this, and exclaimed: “The most wonderful part of it all is, that I should ever have got you to believe the nonsense I talked.” “It is no proof of my stupidity, but of your cleverness.” “Oh, how rude I was!” she cried, looking at me almost gaily, and losing her subdued manner. “How you stared when I refused to take your arm and to give you my cup to put down! I was silly to misbehave myself so to _you_; but rather than allow any man to hang about me with sickly compliments, owing wholly to commercial inspirations, I would have acted ten times more boldly and rudely, and never have rested until I had driven him out of the house, detesting my very name!” “I believe you,” said I, amused by the gleam in her eyes, and by her recurrence to some points of the character she had discarded. “But we won’t talk of it. Tell me about yourself and Conny. Are you engaged?” “No. Uncle Tom refuses his consent; and I ought to add that Conny isn’t positively in love with me yet--at least she says she isn’t.” “I don’t suppose Tom’s sanction would trouble you much, would it?” she asked, making me smile, not only by her familiar reference to her uncle, but by her off-hand manner, which, now that it was associated with nothing of rudeness, I found extremely agreeable, piquant, and characteristic. “If Conny loved me, her father’s consent, I believe, would follow. Her mamma is strongly on my side.” “I should never bother about relations’ opinions much,” said she. “People only marry each other, not each other’s family. Why does Tom object?” “Because I’ve got no money.” She pondered my reply for a little in silence, then took up the album, opened it at Conny’s picture, and mused over it.