"But last night"-- she stops, clasps her hands, and sits back on her heels.

"Oh no! I shan't tell you what I dreamt last night," says she.

She shakes her head at him.

"No, no! indeed, not if you asked me _for ever!"_ "Oh, but you must!" says he, laughing.
He catches her hands and draws her up gently into a kneeling position once more--a position that brings her slender body resting against his knees.
"Must I ?" She pauses as if in amused thought, and then, leaning confidentially across his knees, says, "Well, then, I dreamt that you were madly in love with _me!_ And, oh, the joy of it!" She breaks off, and gives way to irrepressible laughter.

Covering her face with her hands, she peeps at him through her fingers as a child might who is bent on mischief.
"Is all that true ?" asks Maurice, colouring.
"What, the first dream or the second ?" "I presume one is as true as the other," somewhat stiffly.
"You are a prophet," says Tita, with a little grimace.