"Oh, she tells me that you've met Laura Wilde!" she said.
The sacred name struck him, after his impassioned dreaming, like a sharp blow between the eyes, and he met the girl's animated gesture with a look of blank aversion.
"I've met her--yes," he answered coldly.
But her enthusiasm was at white heat, and he saw what he had thought mere prettiness in her warm to positive beauty.

"And you adore her work as I do ?" she exclaimed.
After a moment's hesitation his ardour flashed out to meet her own.

"Oh, yes, I adore her work and her!" he said..