"I am thirty-four. I am sorry that I have impressed you as looking too young to be taken seriously, but you will admit that if a man doesn't know his own mind when he is verging toward middle age, he never will. But if I were only twenty-five, it would make no difference. I would marry you like a shot. I never have given a thought to marrying before. Girls don't interest me. They show their hand too plainly. I've always had a sort of ideal and you fill it." It was characteristic of Mrs. Balfame's well-ordered mind that her intention to murder her husband did not intrude itself into this unique and provocative hour. She had never indulged in a passing desire to marry again, and hers was not the order of mind that somersaults. But she was willing to "let herself go," for the sake of the experience; for the first time in her twenty odd years of married life to loiter in a leafy shadowy street with a man who loved her and made no secret of it. "I wonder?" She stared up at him, curiosity in her eyes. "Wonder what?" "If it _is_ love?" He laughed unmusically. "I am not surprised that you ask that question--you, who know no more of love than if you had been a castaway on a desert island since the age of ten. Never mind. I've planted a seed. It will sprout. Think and think again. You owe me that much--and yourself. I know that six months hence you will have divorced Dave Balfame, and that you will marry me as soon as the law allows." "Never! Never!" She was laughing now, but with all the gay coquetry of youth, not merely the eidola of her own. They had arrived at the gate of the Balfame Place, which faced the avenue and a large street lamp. She put the gate between them with a quicker movement than she commonly indulged in and held out her hand. "No more nonsense! If I were young and free--who knows? But--but--forty-two!" She choked but brought it out. "Now go home and think over all the nice girls you know and select one quickly. I will make the wedding cake." "Did you suppose I didn't know your age? This is Elsinore, and its inhabitants are five thousand. When you and I were born--of respectably eminent parentage--all Brabant County numbered few more." He made no attempt to open the gate, but he raised her hand to his lips. Even in that rare moment he was conscious of a regret that it was such a large hand, and his head jerked abruptly as he flung out the recreant thought. "I never shall change," he said. "And you are to think and think. Now go. I'll watch until you are indoors." "Good night." She ran up the path, wondering if her tall slight figure looked as willowy as it felt. The mirror had often surprised her with the information that she looked quite different from the image in her mind. She also wondered, with some humour, why no one ever had discovered her apparently obvious charms before.