While listening to this daughter of a man who made ladders the Honourable Gerald had been swiftly thinking of an intriguing phrase that leaped into his mind. Social plesiomorphism, that was it! Caste was humbug, no doubt, but even if it was conscious humbug it was there, really there, like the patterned frost upon a window pane, beautiful though a little incoherent, and conditioned only by the size and number of your windows. (Eighteen windows in that pub!) But what did it amount to, after all? It was stuck upon your clear polished outline for every eye to see, but within was something surprising as the sight of a badger in church—until you got used to the indubitable relation of such badgers to such churches. Fine turpitudes! “My dear girl,” he burst out, “your mother and you were right, absolutely. I am sure life is enhanced not by amassing conventions, but by destroying them. And your feeling for your father is right, too, rightest of all. Tell me ... let me ... may I take you back to him?” The girl’s eyes dwelt upon his with some intensity. “Your courage is kind,” she said, “but he doesn’t know you, nor you him.” And to that she added, “You don’t even know me.” “I have known you for ten thousand years. Come home to him with me, we will go back together. Yes, you can explain. Tell him”—the Honourable Gerald had got the bit between his teeth now—“tell him I’m your sweetheart, will you—will you?” “Ten thousand ...! Yes, I know; but it’s strange to think you have only seen me just once before!” “Does that matter? Everything grows from that one small moment into a world of ... well of ... boundless admiration.” “I don’t want,” said Orianda, reopening her crimson parasol, “to grow into a world of any kind.” “No, of course you don’t. But I mean the emotion is irresistible, ‘the desire of the moth for the star,’ that sort of thing, you know, and I immolate myself, the happy victim of your attractions.” “All that has been said before.” Orianda adjusted her parasol as a screen for her raillery. “I swear,” said he, “I have not said it before, never to a living soul.” Fountains of amusement beamed in her brilliant eyes. She was exquisite; he was no longer in doubt about the colour of her eyes—though he could not describe them. And the precise shade of her hair was—well, it was extraordinarily beautiful. “I mean—it’s been said to me!” “O damnation! Of course it’s been said to you. Ah, and isn’t that my complete justification? But you agree, do you not? Tell me if it’s possible. Say you agree, and let me take you back to your father.” “I think I would like you to,” the jolly girl said, slowly. II