I supposed you had frightened her.

But neither would she keep it--" "You bade her not," he put in, in a quick low tone.
"If you like, I prayed her not.

Did it need much cleverness to see what was meant by keeping it ?" His mouth twitched.

I saw the tempest rising again in him.

But for a little longer he held it down.
"Do you take me for a fool ?" he asked.
"Am I a boy--do I know nothing of women?
And do I know nothing of men ?" And he ended in a miserable laugh, and then fell again to tugging his mustache with his shaking hand.
"You know," said I, "what's bad in both; and no doubt that's a good deal." In that very room the duchess had called Gustave de Berensac a preacher.
Her husband had much the same reproach for me.
"Sermons are fine from your mouth," he muttered.
And then his self-control gave way.