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Rh quietly as you did I never supposed for a moment that you could have had a lover; but very early in the day, from one or two chance remarks of yours, I gathered that you had, and never did a man chafe more under the knowledge than I. You would neither deny nor corroborate anything, and sometimes I felt certain you were beginning to care for me, sometimes, I believe, you were hankering after that man at Silverbridge, and at last"

"You told stories," I say, laughing gently; "you told me you were in love with somebody."

"So I was."

"And that you would show her to me."

"So I will."

"And your behaviour was inexcusable."

"I know it; but why, you little minx, did you rout me so utterly that morning in the garden? I was telling you my love story full sail, on the point of asking you if you would try and love me, when out you tumbled a letter from your precious lover, with whom you told me, with inimitable sang froid, you corresponded. And I had fondly imagined (after getting over the first unpleasant shock of your having a lover at all), that you cared nothing about him, flouted his attentions, and would none of them! In self-defence I invented a fiction, and even then, so stubborn were you, madam, I could not gather from your face any more than that you were disturbed, though whether on his account or mine, I could not for the life of me tell. I caught you by a promise, Nell, and made up my mind that here, where we first met, I would ask you a plain question, receive a plain answer."

"It is a plain answer," I say ruefully; "for your sake I wish it were a prettier one!"

"Little sweetheart!" he says, devouring my face with his eyes, "do you remember how I told you years and years ago to pray that you might never grow up good-looking? Well, I am glad you did