He knew she was in earnest, quite as much by the expression of her face as by her words, and for a moment he felt bewildered and stunned with his sense of loss and pain which was all the greater because he had expected a different answer from her. Not expected her to say yes at once, for that was not her nature. She would tease him, and maybe laugh at him, and call him old, as she had sometimes done, when he was conscious of trying to act young. She would assume all these coquettish manners which he thought so charming, and then in the end she would lay her little hands in his, and answer in her saucy way: “You can have me if you really want me, but you will get a bad bargain.” This, or something like it, was what he had fondly imagined, and alas, the result was so different. The little hands he had expected to be laid in his were locked firmly together, and the girl stood up erect and dignified before him, with no coquetry in her manner, or even shyness, as she gave him her answer which hurt him so cruelly. He was not one to beg and plead as a younger, more impetuous man might have done, and so the blow hurt him worse and made him shiver with a cold, faint feeling as he looked at her for a moment, while she looked back as curiously at him, seeing something in his face which awoke within her a feeling of great pity for him. “Oh, Mr. Beresford,” she said, coming a little nearer to him. “Don’t look at me like that. Don’t care for me so much—I am not worth it. I should not make you happy, I am so high-tempered, and passionate, and bad, and say things you never would forget. Nobody could forget them but Phil, and he has sworn never to do it again. Only to-day he called me a vixen and a termagant, and left me in hot anger, and if I can make him feel like that, what could I not do to you, who are so different—so much more matter-of-fact.” The mention of Phil was unfortunate, and awoke in Mr. Beresford a feeling of bitter jealousy which made him say things he would have given worlds to unsay when it was too late to do so. “Phil!” he repeated, sneeringly. “Yes, I see; I understand; Phil is my rival, and I might have known it. Women always prefer idlers like him, who have—” he stopped suddenly, checked by the expression of the black eyes confronting him so steadily, and growing so fierce and bright, as the girl said: “Well, go on. You did not finish. You said ‘idlers like him, who have—’ Have what? I insist upon knowing what you mean. What is it Phil has which you have not?” Her tone and manner made him angry, and he answered at last: “He has plenty of time at his disposal to make love to you; he has nothing else to do, and women like men with no aim, no object in life; nothing to do but to play the Sardanapalus.”