d: "_I_ don't have to explain anything to her, Lily."

"What do you mean?"

"She knows how things stand. She is perfectly aware of your world's
attitude toward her. She has not the slightest intention of forcing
herself on you, or of asking your indulgence or your charity."

"You mean, then, that she desires to separate you from your family--from
your friends--"

"No," he said wearily, "she does not desire that, either."

His sister's troubled eyes rested on him in silence for a while; then:

"I know she is beautiful; I am sure she is good, Louis--good in--in her
own way--worthy, in her own fashion. But, dear, is that all that you, a
Neville, require of the woman who is to bear your name--bear your
children?"

"She _is_ all I require--and far more."

"Dear, you are utterly blinded by your infatuation!"

"You do not know her."

"Then let me!" exclaimed Mrs. Collis desperately. "Let me meet her,
Louis--let me talk with her--"

"No.... And I'll tell you why, Lily; it's because she does not care to
meet you."

"What!"

"I have told you the plain truth. She sees no reason for knowing you, or
for knowing my parents, or any woman in a world that would never
tolerate her, never submit to her entrance, never receive her as one of
them!--a world that might shrug and smile and endure her as my wife--and
embitter my life forever."

As he spoke he was not aware that he merely repeated Valerie's own
words; he remained still unconscious that his decision was in fact
merely her decision; that his entire attitude had become hers because
her nature and her character were as yet the stronger.

But in his words his sister's quick intelligence perceived a logic and a
conclusion entirely feminine and utterly foreign to her brother's habit
of mind. And she realised with a thrill of fear that she had to do, not
with her brother, but with a woman who was to be reckoned with.

"Do you--or does Miss West think it likely that I am a woman to wound,
to affront another--no matter who she may be? Surely, Louis, you could
have told her very little about me--"

"I never mention you to her."

Lily caught her breath.

"Why?"

"Why should I?"

"That is unfair, Louis! She has the right to know about your own
family--otherwise how can she understand the situation?"

"It's like all situations, isn't it? You and father and mother have your
own arbitrary customs and traditions and standards of respectability.
You rule out whom you