And what I want to know is—well, do you want me?
That's all."
"I—I wish you hadn't asked," she said softly.
"Mebbe it's best you should know a few things before you give me an answer," he went on, ignoring the fact that the answer had already been given.
"I never went after a woman before in my life, all reports to the contrary not withstanding.
The stuff you read about me in the papers and books, about me being a lady-killer, is all wrong.
There's not an iota of truth in it.
I guess I've done more than my share of card-playing and whiskey-drinking, but women I've let alone.
There was a woman that killed herself, but I didn't know she wanted me that bad or else I'd have married her—not for love, but to keep her from killing herself.
She was the best of the boiling, but I never gave her any encouragement.
I'm telling you all this because you've read about it, and I want you to get it straight from me.
"Lady-killer!" he snorted.
"Why, Miss Mason, I don't mind telling you that I've sure been scairt of women all my life.
You're the first one I've not been afraid of. That's the strange thing about it.
I just plumb worship you, and yet I'm not afraid of you.
Mebbe it's because you're different from the women I know.
You've never chased me.
Lady-killer!
Why, I've been running away from ladies ever since I can remember, and I guess all that saved me was that I was strong in the wind and that I never fell down and broke a leg or anything.
"I didn't ever want to get married until after I met you, and until a long time after I met you.
I cottoned to you from the start; but I never thought it would get as bad as marriage.
Why, I can't get to sleep nights, thinking of you and wanting you."
He came to a stop and waited.
She had taken the lace and muslin from the basket, possibly to settle her nerves and wits, and was sewing upon it.
As she was not looking at him, he devoured her with his eyes.
He noted the firm, efficient hands—hands that could control a horse like Bob, that could run a typewriter almost as fast as a man could talk, that could sew on dainty garments, and that, doubtlessly, could play on the piano over there in the corner.
Another ultra-feminine detail he noticed—her slippers. They were small and bronze.
He had never imagined she had such a small foot.
Street shoes and riding boots were all that he had ever seen on her feet, and they had given no advertisement of this.
The bronze slippers fascinated him, and to them his eyes repeatedly turned.
A knock came at the door, which she answered.
Daylight could not help hearing the conversation. She was wanted at the telephone.
"Tell him to call up again in ten minutes," he heard her say, and the masculine pronoun caused in him a flashing twinge of jealousy.
Well, he decided, whoever it was, Burning Daylight would give him a run for his money.
The marvel to him was that a girl like Dede hadn't been married long since.
She came back, smiling to him, and resumed her sewing.
His eyes wandered from the efficient hands to the bronze slippers and back again, and he swore to himself that there were mighty few stenographers like her in existence.
That was because she must have come of pretty good stock, and had a pretty good raising.
Nothing else could explain these rooms of hers and the clothes she wore and the way she wore them.
"Those ten minutes are flying," he suggested.
"I can't marry you," she said.
"You don't love me?"
She shook her head.
"Do you like me—the littlest bit?"
This time she nodded, at the same time allowing the smile of amusement to play on her lips.
But it was amusement without contempt.
The humorous side of a situation rarely appealed in vain to her.
"Well, that's something to go on," he announced.
"You've got to make a start to get started.
I just liked you at first, and look what it's grown into.