Page:The Bostonians (London & New York, Macmillan & Co., 1886).djvu/302

 , laughing. 'He liked me the first time he saw me.'

'Oh, that time!' Olive murmured.

'And still more the second.'

'Did he tell you that in his letter?' Miss Chancellor inquired.

'Yes, my dear, he told me that. Only he expressed it more gracefully.' Verena was very happy to say that; a written phrase of Basil Ransom's sufficiently justified her.

'It was my intuition—it was my foreboding!' Olive exclaimed, closing her eyes.

'I thought you said you didn't dislike him.'

'It isn't dislike—it's simple dread. Is that all there is between you?'

'Why, Olive Chancellor, what do you think?' Verena asked, feeling now distinctly like a coward. Five minutes afterwards she said to Olive that if it would give her pleasure they would leave New York on the morrow, without taking a fourth day; and as soon as she had done so she felt better, especially when she saw how gratefully Olive looked at her for the concession, how eagerly she rose to the offer in saying, 'Well, if you do feel that it isn't our own life—our very own!' It was with these words, and others besides, and with an unusually weak, indefinite kiss, as if she wished to protest that, after all, a single day didn't matter, and yet accepted the sacrifice and was a little ashamed of it—it was in this manner that the agreement as to an immediate retreat was sealed. Verena could not shut her eyes to the fact that for a month she had been less frank, and if she wished to do penance this abbreviation of their pleasure in New York, even if it made her almost completely miss Basil Ransom, was easier than to tell Olive just now that the letter was not all, that there had been a long visit, a talk, and a walk besides, which she had been covering up for ever so many weeks. And of what consequence, anyway, was the missing? Was it such a pleasure to converse with a gentleman who only wanted to let you know—and why he should want it so much Verena couldn't guess—that he thought you quite preposterous? Olive took her from place to place, and she ended by