"No, I think not," replied she gravely. "But you mustn't say those
things!"

"Why not?" Into his eyes came their strongest, most penetrating look. "I
want you. And I don't intend to give you up. It isn't my habit to give
up. So, sooner or later I get what I go after."

"You make me--afraid," she said nervously.

"Of what?" laughed he. "Not of me, certainly. Then it must be of
yourself. You are afraid you will end by wanting me to want you."

"No--not that," declared she, confused by his quick cleverness of
speech. "I don't know what I'm afraid of."

"Then let's go to your father. . . . You'll not tell Tetlow what I've
said?"

"No." And once more her simple negation gave him a sense of her absolute
truthfulness.

"Or that I've been here?"

She looked astonished. "Why not?"

"Oh--office reasons. It wouldn't do for the others to know."

She reflected on this. "I don't understand," was the result of her
thinking. "But I'll do as you ask. Only, you must not come again."