She was sitting in the vague glow of the fire-light, in a wonderful blue dress, with two little blue feet crossed on the rug and pointed at the hearth. She received Bernard’s announcement with small satisfaction, and expended a great deal of familiar ridicule on his project of a journey to California. Then, suddenly getting up and looking at him a moment--
“I am glad to hear my explanations have not been lost.”
“Your explanations are all nonsense. You are going for another reason.”
“Well,” said Bernard, “if you insist upon it, it ‘s because you are too sharp with me.”
“It ‘s because of me. So much as that is true.” Bernard wondered what she was going to say--if she were going to be silly enough to allude to the most impudent of fictions; then, as she stood opening and closing her blue fan and smiling at him in the fire-light, he felt that she was silly enough for anything. “It ‘s because of all the talk--it ‘s because of Gordon. You need n’t be afraid of Gordon.”
“Afraid of him? I don’t know what you mean,” said Bernard, gravely.
“You have discovered that people are talking about us--about you and me. I must say I wonder you care. I don’t care, and if it ‘s because of Gordon, you might as well know that he does n’t care. If he does n’t care, I don’t see why I should; and if I don’t, I don’t see why you should!”
“You pay too much attention to such insipid drivel in even mentioning it.”
“Well, if I have the credit of saying what I should n’t--to you or to any one else--I don’t see why I should n’t have the advantage too. Gordon does n’t care--he does n’t care what I do or say. He does n’t care a pin for me!”
She spoke in her usual rattling, rambling voice, and brought out this declaration with a curious absence of resentment.
“You talk about advantage,” said Bernard. “I don’t see what advantage it is to you to say that.”
“I want to--I must--I will! That ‘s the advantage!” This came out with a sudden sharpness of tone; she spoke more excitedly. “He does n’t care a button for me, and he never did! I don’t know what he married me for. He cares for something else--he thinks of something else. I don’t know what it is--I suppose it ‘s chemistry!”
These words gave Bernard a certain shock, but he had his intelligence sufficiently in hand to contradict them with energy.