Page:Claire Ambler (1928).djvu/116

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and I am glad to say that fellow will now be twice as much my enemy as before—and you come to sit with me. But pretty soon you will go and dance with one of those fellows again; so it is all too much up and down!"

"Arturo!" she cried; and she added disingenuously: "I haven't an idea what you're talking about!"

He smiled sadly. "I was so flatter' that you call me 'Arturo'—until I found you call the Bastoni, also, by their firs' names."

"But that's nothing! At home we all do that—with everybody."

"Yes, I understand," he said. "That was what remove' my happiness in it. It was only one of the downs that come between the ups. You will let me explain what I mean by the ups and downs? I think you know very well what thoughts I have about you; but I cannot speak clearly of them to you until you let me see they would be agreeable to you. Well, you will not let me find that out. One hour you lif' me up to where I begin to think you will be not displeased if I speak of what I feel; and the next hour, you send me down to where I find nothing but a confusion in my mind. You see, I am a little baffle' and not very happy; it seems to me I have no advantage