“If you insist on knowing my reasons,” said Hermione, “they are three, as nearly as I can take an inventory at short notice. In the first place, I don’t love him. In the second place, I do love Orestes. In the third place, Pyrrhus is a good deal of a brute, from all I have heard, and the strong-handed sort of husband doesn’t appeal to me. I wonder that you continue the discussion. Let Pyrrhus come; I will look at him, as you wish, and then he can go home. All this talk makes me care less for him every day.”

“If my object were merely to arrange a marriage between you and Pyrrhus,” said Helen, “I certainly would not talk so much about it; I realise that the effect may be as you say. You may come to hate the sound of his name, and you may develop a strong dislike for me. When you see him, perhaps you will like him in spite of all that I have said in his favour. But however that may be, I wish you to become acquainted with a few plain truths about marriage, which most girls learn too late. It is your education I have set my heart on, even more than your marriage. If there were another way to bring the ideas to your mind, I wouldn’t put them into words. Forgive me if I weary you, Hermione. Perhaps you could understand my point of view, if you made the effort; we of the elder generation have a point of view, you know. It comes from having brought children into the world. We wish to give them a better life than we had. The only way is to put our experience at their disposal. But nothing annoys the young so much. Now I don’t pretend to know everything about love, but I know a great deal more than you do, and your three reasons for not considering Pyrrhus seem to me absurd. Don’t be angry! Some day they will seem so to you, even though you continue to love Orestes.”

“They don’t seem absurd to me now,” said Hermione, “and I’m the one who has to decide.”

“You are,” said Helen, “and I want you to decide with your eyes open, without deceiving yourself. You don’t love Pyrrhus, you say. Why should you? You haven’t met him. But he is coming here in a few weeks. I’m not asking you to lose your heart to him; I’m giving you fair warning that though you haven’t seen him, and though you are now, as you think, in love with another man, you may wish you belonged to Pyrrhus, body and soul, twenty-four hours after you have met him. Don’t think you are the one woman in history to whom that could not happen.”