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“You can laugh!” she cried, leaping from his knee and confronting him, her cheeks flaming with real indignation. “You can laugh as much as you please, but I’m not laughing ... not laughing at all, I assure you ... nor would you if you knew how you have offended and affronted me.”

“Is this serious?” Basil asked, getting to his feet after one painfully astonished glance at her. “A joke must not be carried too far, you know, my dear.”

Laurence blushed crimson. She was as yet a novice at such a game, and her lord and master looked extraordinarily imposing, towering there in that bijou room, walled and ceiled with white plush, like an écrin made to hold a pearl. For the first time she saw new possibilities in him, and a cold shudder ran down her back. Was she to resort again to tears, she quickly reflected, or was it wiser to fight the matter out, and obtain the mastery, now and at once?

“Are you serious?” he repeated, sternly enough now; and she winced.

“Quite serious,” she murmured, trying to steady the trembling of her lips. “It is sickening to see you lost in admiration before your cousin and everything your cousin does.”