"_I?_ not in the least," he replies, with an air of ostentatious indifference, but with a complexion undoubtedly florider than nature made his. "You look excessively cross, and have not uttered a word for the last half mile," she says, pouting out her full red under-lip, and then looking (a little alarmed at her own audacity) to see in what spirit he takes her impertinence. "When I do not get civil answers to civil questions, I think it best to hold my tongue," he says, stalking along with his head up, and hitting viciously with his umbrella at the tall, yellow mulleins in the hedge. "People's ideas differ as to what _are_ civil questions," says Essie, trying to stalk too, and to elevate nose and chin in emulation of his. "Suppose that I had asked you how many times you had been refused, would you have answered me?" "Undoubtedly I should," he replies, gravely. "How many times have you?" she asks, coming down from her elevation of offended dignity with a jump, and looking up at him with naïve, eager curiosity. "Questions should be answered in the order of priority in which they are asked," he replies, with a smile of amusement at her simplicity, but with a good deal of dissatisfied doubt underlying the smile. "Answer my question, and I'll answer yours." Esther turns away, and passes her hand along the hedge, catching idly at any grasses or flowers that come in her way, to the great detriment of her Sunday gloves. His anxiety overcomes his hurt pride. "Give me an answer one way or another," he says, breathing rather short. "Is there not something between you and him?" Esther is silent. "No" is a plain downright lie, at which conscience demurs, and "Yes" a cannon-ball that will knock her away from St. John's side out into the drear, great world for ever. "For God's sake answer me!" he says again, in great agitation at a dumbness that seems to him ominous. Hearing the sharp pain and angry fear in his voice, she hesitates no longer. Lie or no lie, she takes the plunge. "Nothing!" she says, faintly, turning first milk-white, then red as a rose in her burning prime. "Why do you turn away your face? Are you quite certain?" he asks, quickly, only half convinced by her weak negation. "Certain," she replies, indistinctly, as if just able to echo his words, but not to frame any of her own. "Why do you stammer and blush, then, whenever his name is mentioned?" he asks, with jealous impatience. "I won't stand being catechised in this way," she cries, blazing out angrily, and stopping short, while sparks of fire, half quenched in tears of vexation, dart from the splendid night of her eyes. "I have answered a question which you ought never to have asked; you must be a person of very little observation," she continues, sharply, "not to have discovered during the three weeks that I have been with you that I blush at everything and nothing; I should be as likely as not to blush when Sir Thomas's name was mentioned, or--or----"