There was something so perfectly maddening in this cool assumption that her bitter chagrin on his account was a fond jealousy, that she fairly choked with exasperation, and shook herself away from his caress as if a snake had stung her. Her thin nostrils vibrated, her red lips trembled with scorn, and her black eyes flashed ominously. He had only seen them lighten with love before, and it was a very odd sensation to see them for the first time blazing with anger, and that against himself. Affecting an offended tone, he said:-- “This is really too absurd, Annie,” and left the room as if in a pet, just in time to escape the outburst he knew was coming. She sat in the parlor with firm-set lips till quite a late hour that evening, hoping that he would come down and give her a chance to set him right with an indignant explanation. So humiliating to her did his misunderstanding seem, that it was intolerable he should retain it a moment longer, and she felt almost desperate enough to go and knock at his door and correct it. Far too clever a strategist to risk an encounter that evening, he sat in his room comfortably smoking and attending to arrears of correspondence, aware that he was supposed by her to be sulking desperately all the while. He knew that her feeling was anger and not grief, and while, had it been the latter, he would have been thoroughly uncomfortable from sympathy, he only chuckled as he figured to himself her indignation. At that very moment, she was undoubtedly clenching her pretty little fists, and breathing fast with impotent wrath, in the room below. Ah, well, let her heart lie in a pickle of good strong disgust overnight, and it would strike in a good deal more effectually than if she were allowed to clear her mind by an indignant explanation on the spot. The following day he bore himself toward her with the slightly distant air of one who considers himself aggrieved, and attempted no approaches. In the evening, which was her first opportunity, she came to him and said in a tone in which, by this time, weariness and disgust had taken the place of indignation:-- “You were absurdly mistaken in thinking that Miss Roberts was trying to flirt.” “Bless your dear, jealous heart!” interrupted Hunt laughingly, with an air of patronizing affection. “I'd no idea you minded it so much. There, there! Let's not allude to this matter again. No, no! not another word!” he gayly insisted, putting his hand over her mouth as she was about to make another effort to be heard.