“My dear Miss Skinner,” protested David, “I think my entrance upon the scene deserves a gentler verb. If you will search your memory, you will find that I came in by express invitation. It was you who deliberately thrust my mock honours upon me.”
“Oh, I know that,” she responded, readily enough. “I thought that would only make the thing funnier still--but somehow it hasn’t. It isn’t anything about Archie and me, you know. But there is another element in the case that I feel very keenly about. It has been puzzling me for days, but I only learned the truth last night. I simply _made_ papa tell me. I refused flat-footed to come here to-day, or to do anything else that was reasonable, unless he _did_ tell me. I have a cousin here in England, Mr. Mosscrop, a daughter of my father’s own brother, and she is one of the dearest girls that ever lived.”
“I can readily credit that,” declared David, pointing his meaning with a little inclination of the head.
“Oh, she is far nicer than I am,” cried Adele. “_She_ wouldn’t trifle with the feelings of the man she loved, or play tricks with him just for the sake of fun. In fact, I almost blame her for taking such things too seriously. She hasn’t had too easy a time of it, poor girl, and it has made her, _I_ think, altogether _too_ humble. She met a young man in the midst of her troubles who, it seems, was civil to her, and even kind as men go, and what does she do but just sit down and worship the very memory of him, and cry out her pretty blue eyes over it--and he--he walks off and never gives her another thought. That’s the _man_ of it!”
A gleam of indignation flashed through the moisture in her own eyes as she bent them upon her companion. Her bosom heaved the more as she discerned a broad smile extending itself upon his face.
“Although I might demur to details,” he said, restraining the gaiety which struggled for expression in his voice, “I must not pretend to fail to recognise the portrait you have drawn. I am the guilty man!”
“You laugh at it!” she exclaimed. “To you it seems a joke!”
“Are you so certain that there isn’t a joke concealed somewhere about it?” he suggested, calmly.
“I lose patience with you! You make a jest of everything. Tell me this much: Do you or do you not know her present address?”