"Now you are going to tell me everything about it," he commanded. "To begin with: what made you suddenly change at Trylands after the first afternoon--and then, what is it that makes you so unhappy now?"
"I can't tell you either," I said, very low. I hoped the common grandmother would not take me as far as doing mean tricks to Lady Ver.
"Oh, you have made me wild!" he exclaimed, letting go my hand and leaning both elbows on his knees, while he pushed his hat to the back of his head--"perfectly mad with fury and jealousy! That brute Malcolm! And then looking at Campion at dinner, and, worst of all, Christopher in the box at 'Carmen'! Wicked, naughty little thing! And yet underneath I have a feeling it is for some absurd reason, and not for sheer devilment. If I thought that, I would soon get not to care. I did think it at 'Carmen.'"
"Yes, I know," I said.
"You know what?" he looked up, startled; then he took my hand again and sat close to me.
"Oh, please, please don't, Lord Robert!" I said.
It really made me quiver so with the loveliest feeling I have ever known, that I knew I should never be able to keep my head if he went on.
"Please, please don't hold my hand," I said. "It--it makes me not able to behave nicely."
"Darling," he whispered, "then it shows that you like me, and I sha'n't let go until you tell me every little bit."
"Oh, I can't, I can't!" I felt too tortured, and yet, waves of joy were rushing over me. That is a word, "darling," for giving feelings down the back.
"Evangeline," he said, quite sternly, "will you answer this question, then: Do you like me, or do you hate me? Because, as you must know very well, I love you."
Oh, the wild joy of hearing him say that! What in the world did anything else matter? For a moment there was a singing in my ears, and I forgot everything but our two selves. Then the picture of Christopher waiting for me, with his cold cynic's face and eyes blazing with passion, rushed into my vision, and the duke's critical, suspicious, disapproving scrutiny, and I felt as if a cry of pain, like a wounded animal, escaped me.
"Darling, darling, what is it? Did I hurt your dear little hand?" Lord Robert exclaimed, tenderly.