"He goes on pressing for an answer. What answer shall I give him?" "I will try to answer as if I was a disinterested bystander. You must consider not what he wants, but what you want." "He offers me position and--I suppose--wealth. He wants me to marry him secretly, and to live out of the world, while he smooths matters with his mother." Dick stopped in the middle of the road. "What?" he cried. "He wants you to marry him secretly? The--the--no, I won't use names and language. Marry him secretly and go into hiding? Why? Because you love the man? But you don't. Because he will make you Lady Woodroffe? But he won't--he will hide you away. Because he is rich? My dear, I know all about him. He has no money at all. The money is his mother's; she could cut him off with a shilling, if she liked. Because he is clever? He isn't. He's the laughing-stock of everybody, except the miserable little clique that he belongs to; they talk of Art--who have no feeling for Art; they hand about things they call Art, which are----" "That will do, Dick." "Add to this that he is a moody, ill-conditioned beast. If he loves you, it's because any man would love you. He'd be tired of you in a week. I know the man, my dear; I've made it my business to find out all about him. He is unworthy of you--quite unworthy, Molly. If you loved him it might be different; I say, might, because then there might be some lessening of the misery you would draw on your head--I don't know, it might only mean greater misery--because you would feel his treatment more." "You are incoherent, Dick." "Could you marry a man without loving him, Molly? I ask you that." "Here is a seat," said Molly, evading the question, which is always a delicate one for girls. Should they--ought they--ever to marry without love? One would rather not answer that question. There are conventions, there are things understood rather than expressed, there are imaginations, men are believed to be what they are not, the secret history of men is not suspected, there are reasons which might possibly make love quite a secondary consideration. It is not, indeed, a question which ought to be put to any girl. "Here is a seat," Molly repeated. "It is chilly; but I am tired. Let us sit down for a minute, Dick." He pressed his question. "Could you possibly marry this fellow, Molly, when you cannot respect him or love him?" "About loving a man, Dick. I suppose it's quite possible to marry anybody, whether you love him or not. Whether a girl can screw up her courage to endure a man all day long when she doesn't like him, I don't know. Women have to do a great many things they don't like. Very few women can afford to choose----" "You can, Molly." "And if a man is a gentleman, he may be trusted, I suppose, not to do horrid things. He wouldn't get drunk; he would be tolerably kind; he would not spend all the money on himself; he would not desert one; he wouldn't throw the furniture about."