indelicacy to stare at a
gentleman. I committed both those improprieties. And I said, as if in a
dream, "What does it mean?"

"Permit me to tell you," he replied. "And suppose we sit down?"

He led me to a chair. I have an indistinct remembrance that he was very
affectionate. I don't think he put his arm round my waist to support
me--but I am not sure. I was quite helpless, and his ways with ladies
were very endearing. At any rate, we sat down. I can answer for that, if
I can answer for nothing more.

CHAPTER VIII

"I have lost a beautiful girl, an excellent social position, and a
handsome income," Mr. Godfrey began; "and I have submitted to it without
a struggle. What can be the motive for such extraordinary conduct as
that? My precious friend, there is no motive."

"No motive?" I repeated.

"Let me appeal, my dear Miss Clack, to your experience of children," he
went on. "A child pursues a certain course of conduct. You are greatly
struck by it, and you attempt to get at the motive. The dear little
thing is incapable of telling you its motive. You might as well ask the
grass why it grows, or the birds why they sing. Well! in this matter, I
am like the dear little thing--like the grass--like the birds. I don't
know why I made a proposal of marriage to Miss Verinder. I don't know
why I have shamefully neglected my dear Ladies. I don't know why I have
apostatised from the Mothers' Small-Clothes. You say to the child, Why
have you been naughty? And the little angel puts its finger into its
mouth, and doesn't know. My case exactly, Miss Clack! I couldn't confess
it to anybody else. I feel impelled to confess it to YOU!"

I began to recover myself. A mental problem was involved here. I am
deeply interested in mental problems--and I am not, it is thought,
without some skill in solving them.

"Best of friends, exert your intellect, and help me," he proceeded.
"Tell me--why does a time come when these matrimonial proceedings of
mine begin to look like something done in a dream? Why does it suddenly
occur to me that my true happiness is in helping my dear Ladies, in
going my modest round of useful work, in saying my few earnest words
when called on by my Chairman? What do I want with a position? I have
got a position? What do I want with an income? I can pay for my bread
and cheese, and my nice little lodging, and my two coats a year. What do
I want with Miss Verinder? She has told me with her own lips (this, dea