"No, I know we don't. And I am sure he has managed to make himself agreeable. I dare say he is—handsome." This was a severe effort. "I don't suppose you would call him handsome. I think he's awfully good-looking." "And—pleasant too!" "Oh, he's perfectly delightful—I can't tell you how delightful and dear he is." "A great many men know how to make themselves liked by young girls, my dear,—men whose family connections"—Doris moved uneasily—"are not precisely what one could accept. You see, nice manners are not the only thing to be considered in marriage." "But Dick is all right in himself. He is everything that you and father could possibly wish." "How about his relatives?" calmly and mercilessly inquired Mrs. Winton. "He has always said he is quite sure his father was a gentleman by birth." "About the last thing he would ever think of saying, my dear,—if it really were so." This thrust went deep, and Doris's face was flooded with colour. "You see, it is not merely a question of the man himself. He may be all you think—personally delightful. But when you marry a man, you adopt your husband's family, whatever they are. His mother becomes your mother-in-law. His sisters become your sisters-in-law. That is inevitable." "Then—you know!" "Know what?" "About his people." "He speaks of his grandfather on his mother's side as a clerk in some house of business,—and of her uncle as a farmer. That at least is honest of him." "It was frightfully hard for him to speak out; but he did it—quite openly. And we settled that I was free to tell you, before he came. He couldn't write the whole. But I have seen his mother. She is Mrs. Morris of Wyldd's Farm—Katherine's 'Nurse Molly.'" Mrs. Winton's whole air was aghast. "Doris!" "Yes, I know!" "This is far worse than anything I have imagined. Of all impossible connections! Mrs. Morris. Farmer Paine's niece! The mother of that dreadful Jane! Are you mad?" Doris stiffened instantly. Mrs. Winton saw her own mistake, but could not at once recover herself. "Mrs. Morris!—of all people! And do you know—but of course you do not— all that has just happened? Do you know that her supposed husband has just come back, after being looked upon as dead for twenty years—and that he is not her husband at all, and she will not say who was? For all we know he may have been a convict—a murderer! Farmer Paine is in such distress. He came to see us only two days ago. And you— you would have that person for your mother-in-law!" Doris was silent, and Mrs. Winton spoke again in a different tone. "Of course—I understand. You saw him away from them all, and you did not realise what it would be. No doubt he is unlike the others—unlike that terrible young woman, Jane." Another and longer break. "He did not tell us this in writing."