He turned about, and would have marched out of the room, but she pursued him. ‘You must listen to me. It is not fit that you should carry on this silly importunity. It is exceedingly distressing to her, and might lead to very unpleasant and hurtful remarks.’ Seeing him look sullen, she took breath, and considered. ‘She came to me in great trouble, and begged me to restore your letter, and tell you never to repeat the liberty.’ He struck his hand on his brow, crying vehemently, ‘Cruel girl! She little knows me--you little know me, if you think I am to be silenced thus. I tell you I will never cease! I am not bound by your pride, which has sneered down and crushed the loveliest--’ ‘Not mine,’ said Albinia, disconcerted at his unexpected violence. ‘Yes!’ he exclaimed. ‘I know you could patronize! but a step beyond, and it is all the same with you as with the rest--you despise the jewel without the setting.’ ‘No,’ said Albinia, ‘so far from depreciating her, I want to convince you that it is an insult to pursue her in this ridiculous underhand way.’ ‘You do me no justice,’ said Gilbert loftily; ‘you little understand what you are pleased to make game of,’ and with one of his sudden alternations, he dropped into a chair, calling himself the most miserable fellow in the world, unpitied where he would gladly offer his life, and his tenderest feelings derided, and he was so nearly ready to cry, that Albinia pitied him, and said, ‘I’ll laugh no more if I can help it, Gibbie, but indeed you are too young for all this misery to be real. I don’t mean that you are pretending, but only that this is your own fancy.’ ‘Fancy!’ said the boy solemnly. ‘The happiness of my life is at stake. She shall be the sharer of all that is mine, the moment my property is in my own hands.’ ‘And do you think so high-minded a girl would listen to you, and take advantage of a fancy in a boy so much younger, and of a different class?’ ‘It would be ecstasy to raise her, and lay all at her feet!’ ‘So it might, if it were worthy of her to accept it. Gilbert, if you knew what love is, you would never wish her to lower herself by encouraging you now. She would be called artful--designing--’ ‘If she loved me--’ he said disconsolately. ‘I wish I could bring you to see how unlikely it is that a sensible, superior woman could really attach herself to a mere lad. An unprincipled person might pretend it for the sake of your property--a silly one might like you because you are good-looking and well-mannered; but neither would be Genevieve.’ ‘There is no use in saying any more,’ he said, rising in offended dignity. ‘I cannot let you go till you have given me your word never to obtrude your folly on Miss Durant again.’ ‘Have you anything else to ask me?’ cried Gilbert in a melodramatic tone.