im. "For all her being so beautiful and so well placed," she
went on, "Eunice has never had any life at all, not what you might call
a life. And she might so easily have missed this. It is hard for girls
to realize sometimes that the success of marriage depends on real
qualities in the man, in mastery over things and not just over her
susceptibilities. It is quite the most sensible thing I've known Eunice
to do."

"Only," Peter reminded her for his part, "I'm not just exactly doing it
because it is sensible." Her "of course not" was convinced enough to
have stilled the vague ruffling of his mind, without doing it. He didn't
object to having his qualifications as Eunice Goodward's husband taken
solidly, but why dwell upon them when it was just the particular
distinction of his engagement that it had the intensity, the spiritual
extension which was supposed to put it out of reach of material
considerations. Even Ellen had done better by him than this.

He was forced, however, to come back to the substance of Mrs. Lessing's
comment a few days later when he was being dined at the club by a
twice-removed cousin of the Goodward's, the upright, elderly symbol of
the male sanction which was the most that his fiancee's fatherless
condition could furnish forth. The man was cordial enough; he was even
prepared to find Peter likable; but even more on that account to measure
his relation to Miss Goodward in terms of its being a "good thing."

"It's not, you know," his host couldn't forebear to remind him, "exactly
the sort of a marriage we expected of Eunice; but if the girl is
satisfied----"

"If I hadn't satisfied myself on that point----" Peter reminded him in
his turn.

"Quite so, quite so ... girls have notions sometimes; one never quite
knows ... You'll keep on with your--just _what_ is it you do such
tremendous things with; one hears of course that you _do_ do them----"

"Real estate, brokerage," Peter enlightened him. "I shall certainly keep
on with it. Isn't one supposed to have all the more need of it when
there's an establishment to keep up?"

The symbol waved a deprecating hand. "You'll find it rather an
occupation to keep up with Eunice, I'm thinking. I've a notion she'll go
it, once she has the chance."

"If by going it, you mean going out a great deal, seeing the world and
having it in to see her, well, why shouldn't she, so long as I have the
price?" He could only take it good-naturedly. It was amusing when