"Thank you!" I thought, sarcastically; "but your permission has
nothing to do with it."
"It is useless to discuss the matter," I said aloud. "I cannot argue
the point with you; I have said there is no third alternative."
"I think you are most unkind," and Lucia let two lovely arms and
hands sink over the sides of the chair in gesture of weak despair.
I noticed, indifferently, that she was unnaturally pale.
"If you consent to our marriage, Lucia," I urged, pressing that
alluring waist, "I will promise this, if it will simplify matters--
you shall continue to live as if you were unmarried until you
yourself put things on another footing."
She glanced at me quickly, as I spoke, with an unexpressed surprise.
"Then what would you gain?" she said, coldly, and the unveiled
cynicism in the words went home.
I flushed.
"The certainty," I answered, briefly. "This indefinite state of
things is simply intolerable."
She was silent for a second; then she said violently, the scarlet
flowing over her face up to her eyes--
"No! It would be impossible to maintain such relations as those
after marriage, and you know it! That is quite out of the question!"
I merely shrugged my shoulders in silence.
"I am waiting for your answer, Lucia," I said, after a few moments.
"And if I cannot give you one?"
"Then I leave town to-morrow morning.
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