hat you do mean. I'm so plainly labelled 'worthless'
that you don't have to stop to examine me. You--"

"I didn't--"

"I beg your pardon. I can tell you exactly what you think of me: A young
fool who runs after the latest sensation, to drop it when he finds a
newer one. His head turned by every pretty girl--to whom he says just
the sort of thing he has said to you to-night. Superficial and ordinary,
incapable of serious thought on any of the subjects that interest you.
As for this business affair in Eastman--that's just a caprice, a game to
be dropped when he tires of it. Everything in life will be like that to
him, including his very friends. Come, now--isn't that what you've been
thinking? There's no use denying it. Nearly every time I've seen you
you've said some little thing that has shown me your opinion of me. I
won't say there haven't been times in my life when I may have deserved
it, but on my honour I don't think I deserve it now."

"Then I won't think it," said Roberta promptly, looking up. "I truly
don't want to do you an injustice. But you are so different from the
other men I have known--my brothers, my friends--that I can hardly
imagine your seeing things from my point of view--"

"But you can see things from mine without any difficulty!"

"It isn't fair, is it?" Her tone was that of the comrade, now. "But you
know women are credited with a sort of instinct--even intuition--that
leads them safely where men's reasoning can't always follow."

"It never leads them astray, by any chance?"

"Yes, I think it does sometimes," she owned frankly. "But it's as well
for the woman to be on her guard, isn't it? Because, sometimes, you
know, she loses her head. And when that happens--"

"All is lost? Or does a man's reasoning, slower and not so infallible,
but sometimes based on greater knowledge, step in and save the day?"

"It often does. But, in this case--well, it's not just a case of
reasoning, is it?"

"The case of my falling in love with a girl I've only
known--slightly--for four months? It has seemed to me all along it was
just that. It's been a case of the head sanctioning the heart--and you
probably know it's not always that way with a young man's experiences.
Every ideal I've ever known--and I've had a few, though you might not
think it--every good thought and purpose, have been stimulated by my
contact with the people of your father's house. And since I have met you
some new ideals have been born.