“Look here,” I said. “You didn’t get into a row about yesterday, I hope?”

Megan said with assurance, “Oh, no,” and then blinked, and said vaguely, “Yes, I believe I did. I mean, they said a lot of things and seemed to think it had been very odd—but then you know what people are and what fusses they make all about nothing.”

I was relieved to find that shocked disapproval had slipped off Megan like water off a duck’s back.

“I came round this morning,” I said, “because I’ve a suggestion to make. You see I like you a lot, and I think you like me—”

“Frightfully,” said Megan with rather disquieting enthusiasm.

“And we get on awfully well together, so I think it would be a good idea if we got married.”

“Oh,” said Megan.

She looked surprised. Just that. Not startled. Not shocked. Just mildly surprised.

“You mean you really want to marry me?” she asked with the air of one getting a thing perfectly clear.

“More than anything in the world,” I said—and I meant it.

“You mean, you’re in love with me?”

“I’m in love with you.”

Her eyes were steady and grave. She said:

“I think you’re the nicest person in the world—but I’m not in love with you.”

“I’ll make you love me.”

“That wouldn’t do. I don’t want to be made.”

She paused and then said gravely: “I’m not the sort of wife for you. I’m better at hating than at loving.”

She said it with a queer intensity.

I said, “Hate doesn’t last. Love does.”

“Is that true?”

“It’s what I believe.”

Again there was a silence. Then I said:

“So it’s ‘No,’ is it?”

“Yes, it’s no.”

“And you don’t encourage me to hope?”

“What would be the good of that?”

“None whatever,” I agreed, “quite redundant, in fact—because I’m going to hope whether you tell me to or not.”

II

Well, that was that. I walked away from the house feeling slightly dazed but irritatingly conscious of Rose’s passionately interested gaze following me.

Rose had had a good deal to say before I could escape.