Whether policy, diplomacy, simplicity, or
just inspiration, he kept up his talk, rather deliberate, with very few
pauses. Then suddenly as if recollecting himself:
"It's funny. I don't think you are annoyed with me for giving you my
company unasked. But why don't you say something?"
I asked Miss de Barral what answer she made to this query.
"I made no answer," she said in that even, unemotional low voice which
seemed to be her voice for delicate confidences. "I walked on. He did
not seem to mind. We came to the foot of the quarry where the road winds
up hill, past the place where you were sitting by the roadside that day.
I began to wonder what I should do. After we reached the top Captain
Anthony said that he had not been for a walk with a lady for years and
years--almost since he was a boy. We had then come to where I ought to
have turned off and struck across a field. I thought of making a run of
it. But he would have caught me up. I knew he would; and, of course, he
would not have allowed me. I couldn't give him the slip."
"Why didn't you ask him to leave you?" I inquired curiously.
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