.
They included all young girls, and his mother, and all young women who
were happily married. It will be admitted that, for a man who made no
pretence to higher virtues, Brook was no worse than his contemporaries,
and was better than a great many.

Be that as it may, in lack of any finer means of discrimination, he
tried to define his own position with regard to Clare Bowring very
simply and honestly. Either he was falling in love, or he was not.
Secondly, Clare was either the kind of girl whom he should like to
marry, spoken of by his practical mother--or she was not.

So far, all was extremely plain. The trouble was that he could not find
any answers to the questions. He could not in the least be sure that he
was falling in love, because he knew that he had never really been in
love in his life. And as for saying at once that Clare was, or was not,
the girl whom he should like to marry, how in the world could he tell
that, unless he fell in love with her? Of course he did not wish to
marry her unless he loved her. But he conceived it possible that he
might fall in love with her and then not wish to marry her after all,
which, in his simple opinion, would have been entirely despicable. If
there were any chance of that, he ought to go away at once. But he did
not know whether there were any chance of it or not. He could go away in
any case, in order to be on the safe side; but then, there was no reason
in the world why he should not marry her, if he should love her, and if
she would marry him. The question became very badly mixed, and under the
circumstances he told himself that he was splitting hairs on the
mountains he had made of his molehills. He determined to stay where he
was. At all events, judging from all signs with which he was
acquainted, Clare was very far indeed from being in love with him, so
that in this respect his sense of honour was perfectly safe and
undisturbed.

Having set his mind at rest in this way, he allowed himself to talk with
her as he pleased. There was no reason why he should hamper himself in
conversation, so long as he said nothing calculated to make an
impression--nothing which could come under the general head of "making
love." The result was that he was much more agreeable than he supposed.
Clare's innocent eyes watched him, and her mind was divided about him.

She was utterly young and inexperienced, but she was a woman, and she
believed him to be false, faithless, and designing