Part 61

"Yes!" she said, "I know you're intrepid--but you won't!"

"Why?--why won't I?"

"Because, it would be false to your friend. You have given me to him."

"I have given you to him!" he exclaimed, with denying intonation.

"Yes!--as between you two, you have renounced, in his favor."

"I protest!"

"At least, I so view it," with a teasingly fascinating smile.

"I protest!" he repeated.

"I heard you."

"I protest!" he reiterated.

"Don't you think that you protest over-much?" she inquired sweetly.

"If we were two children, I'd say: 'You think you're smart, don't you?'"

"And I'd retort: 'You got left, didn't you?'"

Then they both laughed.

"Seriously, however--do you really expect Mr. Macloud?" she asked.

"I surely do--probably within two days; and I'm not chaffing when I say that you're the inducement. So, be good to him--he's got more than enough for two, I can assure you."

"Mercenary!" she laughed.

"No--just careful!" he answered.

"And what number am I--the twenty-first, or thereabout?"

"What matters it, if you're the one, at present?"

She raised her shoulders in the slightest shrug.

"I'd sooner be the present one than all the has-beens," he insisted.

"Opinions differ," she remarked.

"If it will advantage any----"

"I didn't say so," she interrupted.

"----I can tell you----"

"Many fables, I don't doubt!" she cut in, again.

"----that we have been rather intimate, for a few years, and I have never before known him to exhibit particular interest in any woman."