Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/161

Rh it, because you're not in the same state."

She had been going on with a luminous "But," when, across the table, he laid his hand on her arm. "I can understand it," he confessed. " I am in the same state."

"Oh, but she likes you so!" Maisie eagerly argued.

Sir Claude literally colored. "That has something to do with it."

Maisie wondered again. "Being liked with being afraid?"

"Yes; when it amounts to adoration."

"Then why are n't you afraid of me?"

"Because with you it amounts to that?" He had kept his hand on her arm. "Well, what prevents is simply that you 're the gentlest spirit on earth. Besides—" he pursued; but he came to a pause.

"Besides—?"

"I should be in fear if you were older—there! See?—you already make me talk nonsense," the young man added. "The question 's about your father. Is he likewise afraid of Mrs. Beale?"

"I think not. And yet he loves her," Maisie mused.

"Oh, no—he does n't; not a bit!" After