"Nonsense," said Lady Chavasse. "Once married, a man of right principles is always safe in them." Sir Geoffry was silent. Not very long ago, he had thought himself safe in his. With every word, it seemed that his shame and his sin came more glaringly home to him. "Then you mean to tell me that you do not like Rachel----" "That I have no love for her. If--if there be any one plea that I can put forth as a faint shadow of excuse for what has happened, it lies in my love for another. Faint it is, Heaven knows: the excuse, not the love. _That_ is deep enough: but I would rather not speak of it to you--my mother." "And that you never will love Rachel?" continued Lady Chavasse, as though he had not interposed. "Never. It is impossible that I can ever love any one but Mary Layne. I am grateful, as things have turned out, that I did not deceive Rachel by feigning what I could not feel. Neither does she love me. We were told to consider ourselves betrothed, and did so accordingly; but, so far as love goes, it has not been so much as mentioned between us." "What else have you to say?" asked Lady Chavasse. "I might say a great deal, but it would all come round to the same point: to the one petition that I am beseeching you to grant--that you will sanction the marriage." Lady Chavasse's hands trembled visibly within their rich lace frills, as they lay passive on her soft dress of fine geranium cashmere. Her lips grew white with agitation. "Geoffry!" "My darling mother." "I have heard you. Will you hear me?" "You know I will." "More than one-and-twenty years ago, my husband died within these walls; and I--I was not eighteen, Geoffry--felt utterly desolate. But, as the weeks went on, I said my child will be born, if God permit, and he will bring me comfort. You were born, Geoffry; you did bring me comfort: such comfort that I thought Heaven had come again. You best know, my son, what our life has been; how we have loved each other: how pleasantly time has flown in uninterrupted happiness. I have devoted myself, my time, my energies, everything I possessed, to you, my best treasure; I have given up the world for you, Geoffry; I had only you left in it. Is it fitting that you should fling me from you now; that you should blight my remaining days with misery; that you should ignore me just as though I were already dead--and all for the sake of a stranger?" "But----" "I have not finished, Geoffry. For the sake of a stranger, whom a few months ago neither you nor I had ever seen? If you think this--if you deem that you would be acting rightly, and can find in your heart to treat me so, why, you must do it." "But what I wish and propose is quite different!" he exclaimed in agony. "Oh, mother, surely you can understand me--and the dilemma I am placed in?" "I understand all perfectly." "Ah yes!"