"Only me."

     "Did you ask to learn?"

     "No."

     "He wished to teach you?"

     "Yes."

     A second pause.

     "Why did he wish it? Of what use could Hindostanee be to you?"

     "He intended me to go with him to India."

     "Ah! here I reach the root of the matter. He wanted you to marry him?"

     "He asked me to marry him."

     "That is a fiction--an impudent invention to vex me."

     "I beg your pardon, it is the literal truth: he asked me more than once, and was as stiff about urging his point as ever you could be."

     "Miss Eyre, I repeat it, you can leave me. How often am I to say the same thing? Why do you remain pertinaciously perched on my knee, when I have given you notice to quit?"