"You disapprove of my liking it, then? Or is it that you grudge me the
happiness I have found here? I think Irish ladies grudge a man a
moment's peace."

"I wonder you have ever prevailed on yourself to associate with Irish
ladies, since they are so far beneath you."

"Did I say they were beneath me, Miss Hickey? I feel that I have made
a deep impression on you."

"Indeed! Yes, you're quite right. I assure you I can't sleep at night
for thinking of you, Mr. Legge. It's the best a Christian can do,
seeing you think so mightly little of yourself."

"You are triply wrong, Miss Hickey: wrong to be sarcastic with me,
wrong to discourage the candor with which you think of me sometimes,
and wrong to discourage the candor with which I always avow that I
think constantly of myself."

"Then you had better not speak to me, since I have no manners."

"Again! Did I say you had no manners? The warmest expressions of
regard from my mouth seem to reach your ears transformed into insults.
Were I to repeat the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, you would retort as
though I had been reproaching you. This is because you hate me. You
never misunderstand Langan, whom you love."

"I don't know what London manners are, Mr. Legge; but in Ireland
gentlemen are expected to mind their own business. How dare you say I
love Mr. Langan?"

"Then you do not love him?"

"It is nothing to you whether I love him or not."

"Nothing to me that you hate me and love another?"

"I didn't say I hated you. You're not so very clever yourself at
understanding what people say, though you make such a fuss because
they don't understand you." Here, as she glanced down the road she
suddenly looked glad.

"Aha!" I said.

"What do you mean by 'Aha!'"

"No matter. I will now show you what a man's sympathy is. As you
perceived just then, Langan--who is too tall for his age,
by-the-by--is coming to pay you a visit. Well, instead of staying
with you, as a jealous woman would, I will withdraw."

"I don't care whether you go or stay, I'm sure. I wonder what you
would give to be as fine a man as Mr. Langan?"

"All I possess: I swear it! But solely because you admire tall men
more than broad views. Mr. Langan may be defined geometrically as
length without breadth; altitude without position; a line on the
landscape, not a point in it."

"How very clever you are!"

"You don't understand me, I see. Here comes your lover, stepping over
the wall like a camel.