"Why should she care?" she asked herself a hundred times that
evening. But the unpleasant truth hourly grew more plain to her
that she did care.
Stanton and her mother quietly ignored her "foolish pique," as
they termed it. In truth the former was so preoccupied with Miss
Burton, and with jealousy of his friend, that he had few thoughts
for anything else.
He admitted to himself that he had never before been so thoroughly
fascinated and awakened; and it was in accordance with his
pleasure-loving, self-indulgent nature to drift on this shining
tide withersoever it might carry him.
But with a growing feeling of disquietude he saw that Van Berg
also was deeply interested in Miss Burton, and, what was worse, he
thought he detected an answering interest on her part.
Occasionally, when the artist's face was turned away so that she
obtained a good profile view of it, Stanton observed her looking
at him with an expression which both puzzled and troubled him. She
seemed to forget everything and every one, and to gaze for a moment
with a wistful, longing intensity that he would give his fortune
for were the glance directed toward himself. And yet when Van Berg
addressed her, sought her society, met her suddenly, there was no
heightening of color, nor a trace of the "sweet confusion" that is
usually inseparable from a new and growing affection in a maiden's
heart.
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