"Nothing to tell anyone," he repeated. "Noth-ing."
"Then let me tell you something." There was an angry thrill in her voice.
"For I am not so selfish and cold-hearted as you are. I have seen nobody
but you all these months. I have never tried harder to please anybody. You
have scarcely noticed me--you have never given me a glance or a thought.
You could interest yourself in that silly Amy and in our foolish Carolyn;
but for me--me--Nothing!"
Cope came down from the throne. If she had lavished her maiden thoughts on
him, by day or evening or at night, he had not known and could hardly be
supposed to know. Indeed, she had begun by treating him with a cursory
roughness; nor had he noticed any great softening later on.
"Listen," he said. Under the stress of embarrassment and alarm his cold
blue eyes grew colder and his delicate nostrils quivered with an effect a
little too like disdain. "I like you as well as another; no more, no less.
I am in no position to think of love and marriage, and I have no
inclination that way. I am willing to be friends with everybody, and
nothing more with anybody." The sentences came with the cruel detachment of
bullets; but, "Not again, not twice," was his uppermost thought.
Pages:
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308