And when he did glance at her calm, untroubled
face, that seemed only a little surprised at his own singular
coldness, he was by no means relieved. He was only convinced of
one thing. In the last five minutes he had settled upon the
irrevocable determination that his present relations with the girl
could exist no longer. He must either tell her everything, or see
her no more. There was no middle course. She was on the brink of
an exposure at any moment, either through her ignorance or her
unhappy pretension. In his intolerable position, he was equally
unable to contemplate her peril, accept her defense, or himself
defend her.
As if, with some feminine instinct, she had attributed his silence
to some jealousy of Don Caesar's attentions, she more than once
turned from the Spaniard to Paul with an assuring smile. In his
anxiety, he half accepted the rather humiliating suggestion, and
managed to say to her, in a lower tone:--
"On this last visit of your American guardian, one would think, you
need not already anticipate your Spanish relations."
He was thrilled with the mischievous yet faintly tender pleasure
that sparkled in her eyes as she said,--
"You forget it is my American guardian's FIRST visit, as well as
his last.
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