'Oh, that wasn't it!' she laughed, too. 'Not at all! Besides, you knew

that! You were perfectly well aware that you had the heroic part, all

through.' 'Indeed, I wasn't aware of it at all! I felt most awfully small, I

assure you.' 'That's because you're not a woman,' observed Margaret thoughtfully.

'No,' she went on, after a short pause, during which Lushington found

nothing to say, 'the revenge you had was much more complete. I don't

think I'll tell you what it was. You might think----' She broke off abruptly, and drew the big garden hat even further over

her eyes. Lushington watched her mouth, as he could see so little of

the rest of her face, but the lips were shut and motionless, with

rather a set look, as if she meant to keep a secret.

'If you don't tell me, I suppose I'm free to think what I please,'

Lushington answered. 'I might even think that you were seized with

remorse for being so extremely horrid and that you went home and

drenched a number of pillows with your tears.' He laughed lightly. Margaret was silent for a moment, but she slowly

nodded and drummed a five-fingered exercise on her knee with her right

hand.

'I cried like a baby,' she said suddenly, with a little snort of

dissatisfaction.

'Not really?' Lushington was profoundly surprised, before he was

flattered.

'Yes. I hope you're satisfied? Was I not right in saying that you were

revenged?' 'You have more heart than you like to show,' he answered. 'Thank you

for caring so much! It was nice of you.' 'I don't believe it was what you mean by "heart" at all,' said

Margaret. 'I don't pretend to have much, and what there is of it is not

a bit of the "faithful squaw" kind. I cried that night about you,

exactly as I might have cried over a poor lame horse, if somebody had

kicked it uphill and I had been brute enough to laugh at its pain!' 'Hm!' ejaculated Lushington. 'Pity, I suppose?' 'Not a bit of it. How rude you are! I should have pitied you at the

time, then. But I didn't, not the least bit. I laughed at you.

Afterwards I cried because I had been such a beast as to laugh, and I

wished that somebody would come and beat me! I assure you, it was

entirely out of disgust with myself that I cried, and not in the least

out of pity for you!' 'I'm delighted to hear it,' said Lushington. 'In the first place, I

should be sorry to have been the direct means of bringing you to tears;

secondly, I hate to be pitied; and thirdly, it's a much more difficult

thing to make a woman disgusted with herself than it is to excite her

compassion by playing lame horse or sick puppy!' Margaret looked at him from under the brim of her hat, throwing her

head far back so as to do so. Then they both laughed a little, and

Lushington felt happy for a moment; but Margaret did not know what she

felt, if indeed she felt anything at all, beyond a momentary

satisfaction in the society of a man she really liked very much, whom

she had once believed she loved, and whom she might still have been

willing to marry if she had not been at the point of beginning her

public career, and if he had asked her, and if--but there were

altogether too many conditions, and for the moment matrimony was out of

sight.




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