"In other words, that I’ll stand anything from you?" she said, smiling. "I don’t know about that, my friend." He looked at her curiously. "I believe you’ll stand a good deal from me—and still like me. I, somehow, count on it." She met his gaze directly, unsmiling now. "A hair divides my sentiments concerning you," she said. "Extremes lie on either side." "Extremes?" "I think so. It would take very little to fix definitely my opinion of you." Sobered, but still curious, he sat his saddle more firmly while the horses paced forward, shoulder against shoulder, along the forest road. "I didn’t suppose you had any very violent opinions concerning me one way or another," he said lightly. "I haven’t—yet." "Or would ever develop them, either," he added, laughing. "I probably never shall." He said, after another silence: "What was it about a hair dividing your sentiments, and that extremes lay on either side?" "I said that, Jim." "Extremes of what?" "Dislike—friendship—I suppose.... I’m a person addicted to extremes." "Hatred is one extreme. Did you mean that, Japonette?" "It is conceivable, fair sir." "And—the other extreme?" "Which?" "The opposite extreme to hate.... Is that conceivable, too?" "Do you mean love?" she asked coolly. "Yes, love, for example." "Well, for example, ask yourself how likely I am to entertain that sentimental extreme in your regard." "Oh," he said; "then all you threaten me with is hatred!" "Absolutely all, cousin James." "Hobson’s choice for mine. No matter how agreeable I may be, placid friendship is my only reward; and if I’m not agreeable, hatred. Is that it?" "Are you not satisfied?" she asked, lifting her prettily shaped eyes. He made no reply. Yet, he had been satisfied, except at intervals during the first flush of their unconventional friendship, when she was still a fascinating novelty to him, when the charming memory of the surprise was still vivid. But since then, recently in fact, other matters, somehow, had intervened—the dawning distaste for his own position, the apparent absence of any future prospect, the gradual conviction that he had no real capacity for decently earning a living, no ability—perhaps no character. His silence seemed to be her answer now; she spurred forward, accepting it. He put his horse to a canter, to a gallop, and they raced away through the woods until they came in sight of the others. Colonel Curmew joined her; Edgerton rode forward with Christine Rivett. That afternoon there was some tennis played; a number of commonplace and very rich people departed, leaving as residue the original house party which Edgerton and his cousins had found there on their arrival, and who now knew one another well enough to separate into sympathetic groups.