She lifted her eyes with a quick look of fear in them, as if it had flashed into her mind that if she were out of the trouble over the letter she had escaped this peril only to be ensnared into an engagement with him. The thought was so plain that Jack burst into a laugh. "You think that being engaged to me isn't being well out of anything, I see," he observed merrily and mercilessly; "but there might be worse things than that even. We shall see. You'll be awfully fond of me before we are through with this." The poor girl turned crimson at this plain reading of her thought. She was but half a dozen years younger than Jack, but he had belonged to an older set than hers, and under thirty half a dozen years seems more of a difference in ages than appears a score later in life. It was not to be expected that she would be talkative in this strange predicament in which she found herself, but what little command she had of her tongue might well vanish if Jack was to read her thoughts in her face. She rallied her forces to answer him. "I know that for doing so foolish a thing," she said, "I deserved whatever I get." "Even if it's being engaged to me," responded he with a roar. "Well, to be honest, I think you do. I don't know what the Count might have done if he had read the letter, but--" "Oh," cried May, clasping her hands with a burst of sunshine in her face, "didn't he read it? Oh, I'm so glad!" "No," Jack answered, "the Count's too much of a gentleman to read another man's letters when he hasn't been given leave. But what have you to say about my reading this letter?" "Oh, you can't have read it!" May cried breathlessly. "Not yet; but as we are engaged of course you give me leave to read it now." She looked for a moment into his laughing eyes, and then sprang up from her chair with a sudden burst of excitement. "Oh, you are too cruel!" she cried. "I hate you!" "Come," he said, not rising, but settling himself back in his chair with a pose of admiring interest, "now we are getting down to nature. Have you ever played in amateur theatricals, May?" She stood struck silent by the laughing banter of his tone, but she made no answer. "Because, if you ever do," he continued in the same voice, "you'll do well to remember the way you spoke then. It'll be very fetching in a play." The color faded in her cheeks, and her whole manner changed from defiance to humiliation; her lip quivered with quick emotion, and an almost childish expression of woe made pathetic her mobile face. She dropped back into her chair, and the tears started in her eyes. "Oh, I don't think you've any right to tease me," she quavered in a voice that had almost escaped from control. "I'm sure I feel bad enough about it." Jack's face sobered a little, although the mocking light of humor did not entirely vanish from his eyes.