I said, interrupting him: "Whatever I mean is not the slightest reflection on either you or her. I really needn't say that. We're broad-minded people--we don't bother about silly conventions.... But some people do--you'd be surprised how many--and my point in mentioning the matter is simply this.... Is it likely that June would risk getting herself talked about in connection with a man of whom she wasn't rather fond?" "I don't think she cares whether people talk about her or not." "Then depend upon it," I answered, "the crisis has been reached. When a woman doesn't care whether people talk about her or not, there's only one conclusion to be drawn. She's in love." "Oh, that's nonsense--if you're trying to make out that she's in love with _me_...." "Perhaps you can think of somebody else, then?" And so it went on. It was uphill work, I can tell you, trying to convince Terry that he wasn't the meanest little worm that ever crawled on the earth. Towards three o'clock the moment came when I judged it safe to mention the word "marriage." If, I said, he thought there was any doubt about her feeling for him, why didn't he put the matter to the obvious test? "Go to her straightforwardly and say: 'I don't want to give up your charming society, but I really must have that job. If, however, you would care to marry me and accompany me to Australia, the difficulty would be rather neatly solved.'" _Marriage_? It was absurd to think of it, he said. He had never dreamed of such a thing, and he never would dream of it. He wouldn't insult her by even discussing it abstractly. What prospects had he? What sort of a life could he ask her to share with him? ... There were some things too ridiculous to be worth discussing, and that was one. Nevertheless, I objected, he had got to discuss it, because it was the only thing left to discuss. To my mind, I said, it was only fair that he _should_ give her the chance of accepting or refusing him. She had shown pretty plainly that she didn't want him to leave her; that was quite as much as she could be expected to do on her own. It was for him to take the next step. "But--_think_ of it, man! Three hundred a year for the two of us, after the sort of life she's been used to! It's _monstrous_!" "That's for her to decide. If she thinks it is, then it is. But if she thinks it isn't--" "Well?" "Then it mightn't be.... You never know. Miracles have been done on three hundred a year before now." "No man has a right to expect miracles," he said. "Every man has a right to perform them," I answered. (Really, for three o'clock in the morning, our conversation was quite brilliant.)