y well."

"Couldn't you foresee what she was bound to become? Personally I should
have said that Lily's future must have been obvious from the time she
was five years old. Certainly at seventeen it must have been. You got
out of her life then: what the hell's your object in coming into it
again now, as you call it, unless you're a sentimentalist? People don't
let passion lapse for six years and pick up the broken thread without
the help of sentiment."

Michael in the middle of the increasing tension of the conversation was
able to stop for a moment and ask himself if this by chance were true.
He was standing by the mantelpiece and tinkling the lusters. Sylvia
looked up at him irritably, and he silenced them at once.

"Sentiment about what?" he asked, taking the chair opposite hers.

"You think Lily's a tart, don't you? And you think I am, don't you?"

He frowned at the brutality of the expression.

"I did think so," he said. "But of course I've changed my mind since
I've seen something of you."

"Oh, of course you've changed your mind, have you?" she laughed
contemptuously. "And what made you do that? My visit to Brighton?"

"Even if _you_ are," said Michael hotly, "I needn't believe that Lily
is. And even if she is, it makes no difference to my wanting to marry
her."

"Sentimentalist," she jeered. "Damned sugar-and-water sentimentalist."

"Your sneers don't particularly affect me, you know," he said politely.

"Oh, for god's sake, be less the well-brought-up little gentleman. Cut
out the undergraduate. You fool, I was married to an Oxford man. And I'm
sitting here now with the glorious knowledge that I'm a perpetual
bugbear to his good form."

"Because you made a hash of marriage," Michael pointed out, "it doesn't
follow that I'm not to marry Lily. I can't understand your objections."

"Listen. You couldn't make her happy. You couldn't make her any happier
than the dozens of men who want to be fond of her for a short time
without accepting the responsibility of marriage. Do you think I let any
one of those dozens touch her? Not one, if I can get the money myself.
And I usually can. Well, why should I stand aside now and let you carry
her off, even though you do want to marry her? I could argue against it
on your side by telling you that you have no chance of keeping Lily
faithful to you? Can't you see that she has no moral energy? Can't you
see that she's vain and empty-headed? Can't you see that? But why