"If I were in your place," he said at length, "I should get off at
Colombo and sail home again on the next boat."
Sybil shook her head slowly but emphatically.
"I am quite sure you wouldn't. For one thing you would be too poor, and
for another you would be too proud."
"Are you very poor?" he asked her point blank.
She nodded.
"And very proud."
"And your people?"
"Only my father is living, and I have quarrelled with him."
"Can't you make it up?"
"No," she said sharply and emphatically. "I could never return to my
father. There is no room for me now that he has married again. I would
sooner sell matches at a street corner than go back to what I have
left."
"So that's it, is it?" said Mercer. He was looking at her very
attentively with his brows drawn down. "You are not happy at home, so
you are plunging into matrimony to get away from it all."
"We have been engaged for three years," she protested, flushing.
"You said that before," he remarked. "It seems to be your only argument,
and a confoundedly shaky one at that."
She laughed rather unsteadily.
"You are not very encouraging."
"No," said Mercer.
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