“I don’t know if this will have any influence upon you,” he said, “but it is worth thinking of: that we cannot live utterly estranged from my family. Some time or other we must seek a renewal of intercourse. _I_ must seek it, not they; and if my Aunt Curtis could in the meantime convey a pleasant impression of you--if she was herself won to be on our side--I don’t say it would be of great consequence, but yet it would be a beginning. I don’t know what you think of my family, Nancy; if you think they are some kind of wild beasts to be avoided; but they can’t be avoided. We shall have to live by them, and it is for our good--it is indispensable--that we should be friends.” “Friends!” cried Nancy, breathless with the effort of listening to him and keeping silence. “Then you may as well throw me over once for all, Arthur. Friends! with those that would take no notice of me--that never so much as named me in their letter.” “That was my fault--that was my fault,” he said, turning round upon her. “I had no right to keep them in the dark. I ought to have gone to my mother and told her, not kept everything in holes and corners.” “You were not a baby!” cried Nancy. “Why, you are four and twenty! Men don’t go and ask their mamma’s leave like girls.” “That may be--but neither do men throw all their relatives over; tear themselves apart from their family. And I will not do it,” said Arthur with sudden self-assertion. “I will do anything in the world to please you but this. I will not quarrel with all who belong to me. As soon as I get an opportunity we must be reconciled to them--_must_, Nancy, there is no alternative. And why should you reject this easy way? My aunt is a kind woman. She will do us a good turn if she can. Try to please her, dear; won’t you try to please her for my sake?”