"Nay; first answer me one question," entreats Dynecourt. "Do you love my cousin?"
"I care nothing for Sir Adrian!" replies Florence distinctly, and in a somewhat raised tone, her self-pride being touched to the quick.
Two figures who have entered the gallery by the second door at the upper end of it, hearing these words uttered in an emphatic tone, start and glance at the tableau presented to their view lower down. They hesitate, and, even as they do so, they can see Arthur Dynecourt seize Florence Delmaine's hand, and, apparently unrebuked, kiss it passionately.
"Then I shall hope still," he says in a low but impressive voice, at which the two who have just entered turn and beat a precipitate retreat, fearing that they may be seen. One is Sir Adrian, the other Mrs. Talbot.
"Dear me," stammers Dora, in pretty confusion, "who would have thought it? I was never so amazed in my life."
Sir Adrian, who has turned very pale, and is looking greatly distressed, makes no reply. He is repeating over and over again to himself the words he has just heard, as though unable or unwilling to comprehend them. "I care nothing for Sir Adrian!" They strike like a knell upon his ears--a death-knell to all his dearest hopes. And that fellow on his knees before her, kissing her hand, and telling her he will still hope! Hope for what? Alas, he tells himself, he knows only too well--her love!
"I am so glad they have made it up," Dora goes on, looking up sympathetically at Sir Adrian.
"Made it up? I had no idea they were more than ordinary and very new acquaintances."
"It is quite a year since we first met Arthur in Switzerland," responds Dora demurely, calling Dynecourt by his Christian name, a thing she has never done before, because she knows it will give Sir Adrian the impression that they are on very intimate terms with his cousin. "He has been our shadow ever since. I wonder you did not notice his devotion in town."
"I noticed nothing," says Sir Adrian, miserably; "or, if I did, it was only to form wrong impressions. I firmly believed, seeing Miss Delmaine and Arthur together here, that she betrayed nothing but a rooted dislike to him."
"They had not been good friends of late," explains Dora hastily; "that we all could see. And Florence is very peculiar, you know; she is quite the dearest girl in the world, and I adore her; but I will confess to you"--with another upward and bewitching glance from the charming blue eyes--"that she has her little tempers. Not very naughty ones, you know"--shaking her head archly--"but just enough to make one a bit afraid of her at times; so I never ventured to ask her why she treated poor Arthur, who really is her slave, so cruelly."