She held up her hands in protest. "No more, I thank you. Let us find a pleasanter topic.... I heard you were leaving us very soon--for Philadelphia. Is it so?" "This is the first I knew of it. Who told you?" She affected to think. "I, really, cannot remember. Some one, in Annapolis, but who it was I do not know." "Because it interested you so little." "No--because I thought you would have told me, were it true. Yet, why should you not be moving on--one does not visit America to see only one place?" "No, I suppose not; I must move on, sometime, but I am in no haste, I assure you. I came to America, intending to loiter indefinitely." There was a queer smile on his face. He was thinking of his father's parting admonition. She did not observe the smile--and it would have conveyed nothing to her if she had. She was occupied with his words. "Intending to loiter indefinitely" did not smack of a wife, left behind in England--unless--unless the wife were the cause of his indefinite loiter. "You have a complaisant family," she remarked. "Yes!" he said, and laughed; "yes, I have a very complaisant family." Then he abruptly changed the subject.--"Shall we walk in the park, or do you prefer the esplanade--or shall we walk, at all?" "The esplanade, by all means," she said, not daring to venture an immediate return to the subject. For it was evident that he had deliberately veered, and, as she had assumed to treat him, hitherto, as unmarried, she might not, now, shift her attitude without just cause. And she had no cause--not even a suspicion that was based on anything. Moreover, for her to question it, now, would be inexcusable, and, if she were wrong, would cause a break in their friendship. And that she was not prepared to chance. In fact, at the present moment, she did not know whether she preferred Sir Edward Parkington or Richard Maynadier. The one was a great catch and a charming man, but he was an American--and, besides, was not sufficiently responsive to her charms; the other was a Britisher, but, she feared, was not for her, who could bring no fortune with her. She stole a glance at her companion. He was slowly plucking to pieces a rose. "What are you doing?" she asked. "Testing _your_ affection:--love me, love me not; love me--shall I continue." "Pray do," she said; "I am curious to know the answer." "It is undecided, then?" banteringly. "Yes--sometimes I do, and sometimes I do not, and sometimes--I am in a state of equipoise. Let the rose tell what it is, at present." "Nay: if you are not constant, the message has no merit--begone!" and he tossed the flower from him. "Ho, fellow!" to a man in servant's clothes, who was passing at a little distance, "I forgot my walking-stick; you will find it by yonder bush--fetch it." The man glanced up, hesitated the fraction of a second, then a smile passed over his face, and he acquiesced. "Very well, sir," he answered, and went on.