She laughed scornfully. “I had a great-aunt, Lady Dee—perhaps you’ve heard of her. She taught me—and I’ve found out through much experience that she was right.” She gazed at him boldly, over the armful of flowers. “‘Sylvia, never let yourself be sorry for men. Let them take care of themselves. They have all the advantage in the game. They are free to come and go, they pick us up and look us over and drop us when they feel like it. So we have to learn to manage them. And, believe me, my child, they like it—it’s what they’re made for!’” “And you believe such things as that?” She laughed, a superbly cynical laugh, and began to gather more flowers. “I used to think they were cruel—when I was young. But now I know that Aunt Lady was right. What else have men to do but to make love to us? Isn’t it better for them than getting drunk, or gambling, or breaking their necks hunting foxes? ‘It’s the thing that lifts them above the brute,’ she used to say. ‘Naturally, the more of them you lift, the better.’” “Did she teach you to deceive men deliberately?” “She told me that when she was ordering her wedding trousseau, she was engaged to a dozen; a cousin of hers was engaged to another dozen, and couldn’t make up her mind which to choose, so she sent notes to them all to say that she’d marry the man who got to her first.” He smiled—his slow, quiet smile. Sylvia did not know how he was taking these things; nor did his next remark enlighten her. “Did it not surprise you to be taught that men were the centre of creation?” “No. They taught me that God was a man.” He laughed, then became grave. “Why do you need so many men? You can’t marry but one.” “Not in the South. But when I am ready to marry that one, I want it to be the one I want; and the only way to be sure is to have a great many wanting _you_. When a man sees a girl so surrounded with suitors that he can’t get near her, he knows it’s the one girl in the world for him. Aunt Lady had a saying about it, full of wisdom.” And Sylvia looked very wise herself. “‘Men are sheep!’” “I see,” he said, somewhat grimly. “I fear, Miss Castleman, I cannot enter such a competition.” “Is it cowardice?” “Perhaps. It has been said that discretion is the better part of valor. You see, to me love is not a game, but a reality. It could never be that to you, I fear.” Poor Sylvia! She was trying desperately hard to remember and make use of her training. But the rules she had learned were, so to speak, for fresh-water sailing; no one had ever thought that her frail craft might be blown out upon a stormy ocean like this. Picture her as a terrified navigator, striving to steer with a broken rudder, and gazing up into a mountain-wave that comes roaring down upon her! He was a man who meant what he said. She had tried her foolish arts upon him and had only disgusted him. He was going away; and once he had left her, she would be powerless to get hold of him again!