"I'm not sure I'm glad you've come after all," she said after a pause.
"Why have you come? I don't quite understand."
"I've come to see you, to look on at your happiness," he answered.
"You've no right to talk like that."
They became silent. From the inner room they heard Lady Attlebridge's
nervous efforts at conversation and Quisante's fluent, too fluent,
responses. He was telling the good lady about her great social influence,
and, little as she liked him, she seemed to listen eagerly. Marchmont
looked at May and smiled. He was disappointed when she returned his
smile.
"He's a little too much of a politician, isn't he?" she asked.
Her refusal to perceive the insinuation of his smile made him ashamed of
it.
"We all are, when we've something to get, I suppose," he said with a
shrug.
"Oh, I don't think you need reproach yourself," she exclaimed, laughing.
There was a short pause. Then he said suddenly,
"You're the one person in the world to talk to."
Now she neither laughed nor yet rebuked him, and, as his eyes met hers,
he seemed to have no fear that she would do either the one or the other.
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