Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/451

Rh indeed herself shaken by the mere sound of it. "So you see you 're not, like her," he exclaimed, "so ready to give me away!" Then he came back to his original question. "Can you choose? I mean can you settle it, by a word, yourself? Will you stay on with us without her?"

Now in truth she felt the coldness of her terror, and it seemed to her that suddenly she knew, as she knew it about Sir Claude, what she was afraid of. She was afraid of herself. She looked at him in such a way that it brought, she could see, wonder into his face, a wonder held in check, however, by his frank pretension to play fair with her, not to use advantages, not to hurry nor hustle her—only to put her chance clearly and kindly before her. "May I think?" she finally asked.

"Certainly, certainly. But how long?"

"Oh, only a little while," she said meekly.

He had for a moment the air of wishing to look at it as if it were the most cheerful prospect in the world. "But what shall we do while you're thinking?" He spoke as if thought were compatible with almost any distraction.