“You do feel it toward the big chap,” he said, scornfully.

She made a renewed effort to explain herself.  “You see, it’s something like this.  If my aunt de Melcourt, who’s very well off, were to come forward and help us, I’d let her do it without scruple.  Not that there’s any particular reason why she should!  But if she did—­well, you can see for yourself that it wouldn’t be as if she were a stranger.”

“Of course!  She’s one of your own people—­and all that.”

“Well, he’s one of our own people—­Mr. Davenant.  Not to the degree that she is—­but the same sort of thing—­even if more distant.  It’s very distant, I admit—­”

His lip curled.  “So distant as to be out of sight.”

“No; not for him—­or for me.”

He sprang to his feet.  “Look here, Olivia,” he cried, nervously, holding his chair by the back, “what does it all mean?  What are you leading up to?”

“I’m telling you as plainly as I can.”

“What you aren’t telling me as plainly as you can is which of us you’re in love with.”

She colored.  It was one of those blushes that spread up the temples and over the brows and along the line of the hair with the splendor of a stormy dawn.

“I didn’t know the question had been raised,” she said, “but since apparently it has—­”

It might have been contrition for a foolish speech, or fear of what she was going to say, that prompted him to interrupt her hurriedly: 

“I beg your pardon.  It was idiotic of me to say that.  I didn’t mean it.  As a matter of fact, I’m jumpy.  I’m not master of myself.  So much has been happening—­”

He came round the table, and, snatching one of her hands, he kissed it again and again.  He even sank on one knee beside her, holding her close to him.  With the hand that remained free she stroked his crisp, wavy, iron-gray hair as a sign of pardon.

“You’re quite wrong about me,” he persisted.

“Even if you’re right about other Englishmen—­which I don’t admit—­you’re wrong about me, by Jove!  If I had to give up everything I had in the world I should have all the compensation a man could desire if I got you.”

She leaned over him, pressing his head against her breast, as she whispered: 

“You couldn’t get me that way.  You must understand—­I must make it as plain to you as I can—­that I couldn’t go to you except as an equal.  I couldn’t go to any man—­”

He sprang to his feet.  “But you came to me as an equal,” he cried, in tones of exasperation.  “That’s all over and done with.  It’s too late to reconsider the step we’ve taken—­too late for me—­much too late!—­and equally too late for you.”

“I can’t admit that, Rupert.  I’ve still the right to draw back.”

“The legal right—­yes; whether or not you’ve the moral right would depend on your sense of honor.”

“Of honor?”

“Certainly.  There’s an honor for you as well as for me.  When I’m so true to you it wouldn’t be the square thing to play me false.”