“Indeed, Helen, I know that you will do for your husband more than other women can,” Miss Carrington said, almost humbly. “That is why I want you for Kit, as you understand quite well. But just why do you want my boy? He is a fine, honest, loyal lad; has a good mind, nice manners; would be no end fond and unselfish, and he is personable--I like that word!--but there are others far richer, others with famous names, better placed in the world. I am glad that you do want Kit, but--why do you? I am sure you are too candid to mind telling me.” Helen sat erect, drew her drapery around her, and leaned her elbows on her knees to elucidate. “Aunt Anne,” she said with considerable earnestness, and omitting the restrictive word in the elder woman’s title, “I suppose no one quite understands these things. I don’t altogether. But I have decided that when I say I want Kit that about covers it. It’s precisely what I said awhile ago about Anne Dallas. Attraction attracts, and you can’t define wherein it lies. Kit’s strong, virile beauty--he really is an awfully well-set-up chap--attracts me. Others may have it, in fact they have; the average college boy gets a lot of it if he trains, but in Kit I like it best. I like the way he nods at me when he says something which he thinks is profound and which I’ve always known. I especially like the way his hair grows in the back of his neck, and he has one funny ear lobe, sort of kinky--ever notice it? He doesn’t know what fear is, either physical or moral; doesn’t stop to find it out that it exists. He has a dandy voice in talking, and he says deliciously fool things about girls! He’s strong, clean--I could do a lot with him if he’d love me. And I’m pretty sure he’d get taught how to love me if I married him. I’d put myself out to teach him, and I know how to teach! I think that’s about all there is to it. As I say, it comes to the one thing with which I started: I want Kit Carrington!” Miss Carrington always sat straight in a straight chair, so she could not be more erect than she had been, yet she had the effect of sitting straighter as she listened to Helen; she became alert. “Helen, child, all that you say must mean, it _does_ mean, that you are in love with Kit! I never dreamed that you were in love with him, but you surely are. I am glad of it. This atavism of mine, as you call it, makes it easier for me to carry out our bargain knowing that you are in love with the boy,” she cried.