Page:The Private Life, Lord Beaupré, The Visits (New York, Harper & Brothers, 1893).djvu/133

Rh flushed through the essential good-humor of his face. Then she saw that this annoyance had exclusive reference to poor Charlotte; so that it left her free to reply, with another laugh: "Well, yes—he does. But you know I like it!"

"I don't, then!" Before she could have asked him, even had she wished to, in what manner such a circumstance concerned him, he added, with his droll agitation: "I never invited her, either! Don't let her get at me!"

"What can I do?" Mary demanded, as the others advanced.

"Please take her away, keep her yourself! I'll take the American, I'll keep him," he murmured, inconsequently, as a bribe.

"But I don't object to him."

"Do you like him so much?"

"Very much indeed," the girl replied.

The reply was perhaps lost upon her interlocutor, whose eye now fixed itself gloomily on the dauntless Charlotte. As Miss Firminger came nearer he exclaimed, almost loud enough for her to hear, "I think I shall murder her some day!"