ives. That may stand: I mean
that, emphatically, and beyond every other impression she made, her
gaze declared that she was ready to believe anything that she were
told, and the more in the telling the better.)

She spoke, as always, with that sense of restrained, sharply
disciplined excitement, as though her eager vitality were some
splendid if ferocious animal struggling at its chain.

"You talked to John--Mr. Trenchard--last night," she said.

"Yes," I said, smiling into her eyes.

"I know--all night--he told me. He's splendid, isn't he? Splendid!"

"I like him very much," I answered.

"Ah! you must! you must! You must all like him! You don't know--his
thoughts, his ideals--they are wonderful. He's like some knight of the
Middle Ages.... Ah, but you'll think that silly, Mr. Durward. You're a
practical Englishman. I hate practical Englishmen."

"Thank you," I said, laughing.

"No, but I do. You sneer at everything beautiful. Here in Russia we're
more simple. And John's very like a Russian in many ways. Don't you
think he is?"

"I haven't known him long enough--" I began.

"Ah, you don't like him! I see you don't.... No, it's no use your
saying anything. He isn't English enough for you, that's what it is.
You think him unpractical, unworldly. Well, so he is. Do you think I'd
ever be engaged to an ordinary Englishman? I'd die of ennui in a week.
Oh! yes, I would. But you like John, really, don't you?"

"I tell you that I do," I answered, "but really, after only two
days--"

"Ah! that's so English! So cautious! How I hate your caution! Why
can't you say at once that you haven't made up your mind about
him--because that's the truth, isn't it? I wish he would not sit
there, looking at me, and not talking to the others. He ought to talk
to them, but he's afraid that they'll laugh at his Russian. It's not
very good, his Russian, is it? I can't help laughing myself
sometimes!"

_Her_ English was extremely good. Sometimes she used a word in its
wrong sense; she had one or two charming little phrases of her own:
"What a purpose to?" instead of: "Why?" and sometimes a double
negative. She rolled her r's more than is our habit.

I said, looking straight into her eyes:

"It's a tremendous thing to him, his having you. I can see that
although I've known him so short a time. He's a very lucky man
and--and--if his luck were to go, I think that he'd simply die. There!
That isn't a very English thing to have said, i