Susan was touched in a raw place. She pouted worse than ever. I couldn't help saying:
"I was thinking, Miss," said the bride-elect, "that they was rather nice."
She actually turned her head, and had begun to take quite a deliberate peep at the rather nice legs, when I addressed her sharply.
"Susan," I said, "so long as you're with me, you'll be so good as to behave yourself properly. I'm surprised."
She recalled her wanton glance at once, and blushed suitably and sufficiently. Gibson is only partly right about Susan's head being turned. If it were turned more than a very, very little, she wouldn't be able to obey so fully and promptly and shamefacedly when I whistle her straying fancy back to heel.
"What have you done with those two magazines?" I asked. "Why don't you read them? If you don't look at him, he won't look at you."
My dutiful Susan did her best. So did I. But my best was no better than Susan's. Try as I would, I couldn't restrain myself from darting an occasional glance at the brute in grey to see if he was still staring; and, try as I might, I couldn't ignore the fact that Susan was doing the same. At the end of about ten minutes, we did it at the same moment.
"You're looking again, Susan," I snapped angrily. It was mean of me and dishonest, I know. Besides, it was taking an ungenerous advantage of my powers as Susan's mistress. But I had to save my dignity. And Susan would have done the same in my place.
"I'm very sorry, Miss," she said. "I was really trying not to, Miss. But it's such a dreadful feeling. I feel as if I _must_ look."
"Susan," I said ingeniously, "we will suppose, just for a moment, that the creature is Lord Ruddington. For your sake, and his own sake, and everybody's sake, I hope and believe he isn't. But let us suppose he is."
"Susan, I put it to you. If he _is_ Lord Ruddington, what will he think of you for casting sheep's eyes at him, and looking up and looking down, and blushing, and all the rest of it?"
"I don't think it's him as ought to complain, Miss," said Susan, "seeing it's him that's making me do it."
"You don't see what I mean. If he's Lord Ruddington, he knows that you're Susan, and he can hardly help looking at you, though I must say he isn't treating you as he would a lady. But when it's a case of _you_ looking at him, it's different. You see, you're not supposed to have any idea it's Lord Ruddington. All you've got to go by is 'a dreadful feeling'--which is nothing at all. So what must he think of you, when he sees you making eyes at a perfect stranger? He must think you've got glances and blushes for every man who chooses to stare at you."