“I have something else to say—­to you alone, Marian.  I entreat you to listen to it seriously.”  Marian looked as grave as she could.  “I confess that in some respects I do not understand you; and before you enter upon another London season, through which I cannot be at your side, I would obtain from you some assurance of the nature of your regard for me.  I do not wish to harass you with jealous importunity.  You have given me the most unequivocal tokens of a feeling different from that which inspires the ordinary intercourse of a lady and gentleman in society; but of late it has seemed to me that you maintain as little reserve toward other men as toward me.  I am not thinking of Marmaduke:  he is your cousin.  But I observed that even the working man who sang at the concert last night was received—­I do not say intentionally—­with a cordiality which might have tempted a more humbly disposed person than he seemed to be to forget——­” Here Douglas, seeing Marian’s bearing change suddenly, hesitated.  Her beautiful gray eyes, always pleading for peace like those of a good angel, were now full of reproach; and her mouth, but for those eyes, would have suggested that she was at heart an obstinate woman.

“Sholto,” she said, “I dont know what to say to you.  If this is jealousy, it may be very flattering; but it is ridiculous.  If it is a lecture, seriously intended, it is—­it is really most insulting.  What do you mean by my having given you unequivocal signs of regard?  Of course I think of you very differently from the chance acquaintances I make in society.  It would be strange if I did not, having known you so long and been your mother’s guest so often.  But you talk almost as if I had been making love to you.”

“No,” said Douglas, forgetting his ceremonious manner and speaking angrily and naturally; “but you talk as though I had not been making love to you.”

“If you have, I never knew it.  I never dreamt it.”

“Then, since you are not the stupidest lady of my acquaintance, you must be the most innocent.”

“Tell me of one single occasion on which anything has passed between us that justifies your speaking to me as you are doing now.”

“Innumerable occasions.  But since I cannot compel you to acknowledge them, it would be useless to cite them.”

“All I can say is that we have utterly misunderstood one another,” she said, after a pause.

He said nothing, but took up his hat, and looked down at it with angry determination.  Marian, too uneasy to endure silence, added: 

“But I shall know better in future.”

“True,” said Douglas, hastily putting down his hat and advancing a step.  “You cannot plead misunderstanding now.  Can you give me the assurance I seek?”

“What assurance?”

Douglas shook his shoulders impatiently.

“You expect me to know everything by intuition,” she said.

“Well, my declaration shall be definite enough, even for you.  Do you love me?”