"I know it's no
business of mine whom you marry, or even whom you drive with, and I beg
your pardon if I seem indiscreet and obtrusive; but I would give
anything just to detach you a little from your ties, your belongings,
and feel for an hour or two, as if--as if----" And he paused.
"As if what?" she asked, very seriously.
"As if there were no such person as Mr. Burrage--as Miss Chancellor--in
the whole place." This had not been what he was going to say; he used
different words.
"I don't know what you mean, why you speak of other persons. I can do as
I like, perfectly. But I don't know why you should take so for granted
that _that_ would be it!" Verena spoke these words not out of coquetry,
or to make him beg her more for a favour, but because she was thinking,
and she wanted to gain a moment. His allusion to Henry Burrage touched
her, his belief that she had been in the Park under circumstances more
agreeable than those he proposed. They were not; somehow, she wanted him
to know that. To wander there with a companion, slowly stopping,
lounging, looking at the animals as she had seen the people do the day
before; to sit down in some out-of-the-way part where there were distant
views, which she had noticed from her high perch beside Henry
Burrage--she had to look down so, it made her feel unduly fine: that was
much more to her taste, much more her idea of true enjoyment. It came
over her that Mr. Ransom had given up his work to come to her at such an
hour; people of his kind, in the morning, were always getting their
living, and it was only for Mr.
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