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331 THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. 331 near the fire, staring straight at the door, so that, not to be distinctly uncivil, Rosier ftad to go and speak to him. " I am glad that you can take a hint," Pansy's father said, slightly closing his keen, conscious eye. " I take no hints. But I took a message, as I supposed it to be." " You took it 1 Where did you take it 1" It seemed to poor Rosier that he was being insulted and he waited a moment, asking himself how much a true lover ought to submit to. " Madame Merle gave me, as I understood it, a message from you to the effect that you declined to give me the opportunity I desire the opportunity to explain my wishes to you." Rosier flattered himself that he spoke rather sternly. " I don't see what Madame Merle has to do with it. Why did you apply to Madame Merle 1 " "I asked her for an opinion for nothing t more. I did so because she had seemed to me to know you ver^ well."- " She doesn't know, me so well as she thinks," said Osmond. " I am sorry for that, because she has given me some little ground for hope. " Osmond stared into the fire for a moment. " I set a great price on my daughter." " You can't set a higher one than I do. Don't I prove it by wishing to marry her 1 " " I wish to marry her very well," Osmond went on, with a dry impertinence which, in another mood, poor Rosier would have admired. "Of course I pretend that she would marry well in marrying me. She couldn't marry a man who loves her more ; or whom, I may venture to add, she loves more." " I am not bound to accept your theories as to whom my daughter loves," Osmond said, looking up with a quick, cold smile. " I am not theorising. Your daughter has spoken." "Not to me," Osmond continued, bending forward a little and dropping his eyes to his boot-toes. " I have her promise, sir ! " cried Rosier, with the sharpness of exasperation. As their voices had been pitched very low before, such a note attracted some attention from the company. Osmond waited till this little movement had subsided, then he said very quickly " I think she has no recollection of having given it."