select you as
his bride. But have you ever seen such a taste--a really exquisite
one--ruffled?"

"I hope it may never be my fortune to fail to gratify my husband's."

At these words a sudden passion leaped to Ralph's lips. "Ah, that's
wilful, that's unworthy of you! You were not meant to be measured in
that way--you were meant for something better than to keep guard over
the sensibilities of a sterile dilettante!"

Isabel rose quickly and he did the same, so that they stood for a moment
looking at each other as if he had flung down a defiance or an insult.
But "You go too far," she simply breathed.

"I've said what I had on my mind--and I've said it because I love you!"

Isabel turned pale: was he too on that tiresome list? She had a sudden
wish to strike him off. "Ah then, you're not disinterested!"

"I love you, but I love without hope," said Ralph quickly, forcing a
smile and feeling that in that last declaration he had expressed more
than he intended.

Isabel moved away and stood looking into the sunny stillness of the
garden; but after a little she turned back to him. "I'm afraid your talk
then is the wildness of despair! I don't understand it--but it doesn't
matter. I'm not arguing with you; it's impossible I should; I've only
tried to listen to you. I'm much obliged to you for attempting to
explain," she said gently, as if the anger with which she had just
sprung up had already subsided. "It's very good of you to try to warn
me, if you're really alarmed; but I won't promise to think of what
you've said: I shall forget it as soon as possible. Try and forget it
yourself; you've done your duty, and no man can do more. I can't explain
to you what I feel, what I believe, and I wouldn't if I could." She
paused a moment and then went on with an inconsequence that Ralph
observed even in the midst of his eagerness to discover some symptom of
concession. "I can't enter into your idea of Mr. Osmond; I can't do it
justice, because I see him in quite another way. He's not important--no,
he's not important; he's a man to whom importance is supremely
indifferent. If that's what you mean when you call him 'small,' then
he's as small as you please. I call that large--it's the largest thing
I know. I won't pretend to argue with you about a person I'm going to
marry," Isabel repeated. "I'm not in the least concerned to defend Mr.
Osmond; he's not so weak as to need my defence. I should think it would
seem strange even to y