can bring into your life," his voice was almost stern, "but I
warn you to be very sure of what you will be shutting out."

"You mean?"

"Children," said Spence crisply.

"I do not care for children."

The professor's soberness vanished. "Oh--what a whopper!" he exclaimed.

"I mean, I do not want children of my own."

"But supposing you were to develop a desire for them later on?"

She nodded thoughtfully.

"I might," she acknowledged. "But in my case it would be merely the
outcropping of a feminine instinct, easily suppressed. I am not at all
afraid of it. Look at all the women who are perfectly happy without
children."

"Hum!" said the professor. "I am looking at them. But I find them
unconvincing. There are a few, however, of whom what you say is true.
You may be one of them. How about Sami?"

"Sami? Oh, Sami is different. He is more like a mountain imp than a
child. I don't think Sami would seem real anywhere but here. If anyone
were to try to transplant him he might vanish altogether. Poor little
chap--how terribly he would miss me!" finished Desire artlessly.

She had accepted the possibility, then! Spence's heart gave a leap and
was promptly reproved for leaping. This was not, he reminded himself,
an affair of the heart at all. It was a coldly-thought-out, hard-headed
business proposition. Such a proposition as his father's son might
fittingly conceive. The thing to do now was to stride on briskly and
avoid sentiment.

"Then as we seem to agree upon the essentials," he said, "there remains
only one concrete difficulty, your father. He would object to marriage
as to other things, I suppose?"

"Yes, but we should have to ignore that."

"You wouldn't mind?" somewhat doubtfully.

"No. I have always known that a break would come some day. It isn't as
if he really cared. Or as if I cared. I don't. If I should decide that
there is an honest chance for freedom, a chance which I can take and
keep my self-respect, I am conscious of no duty that need restrain me."

Spence said nothing, and after a moment she went on.

"Why should I pretend--as he pretends? I loath it! Day after day, even
when there is no one to see, he keeps up that horrible semblance of
affection. And all the time he hates me. I see it in his eyes. And once
or twice--" She hesitated and then went rapidly on without finishing
her sentence. "There is some reason why it is to his advantage to keep
me with him. But it imposes no obligation