"Yes, I think perhaps I should love her all the more, though just at first perhaps I shouldn't like it--I mean I shouldn't like _anybody_ to marry him. It's difficult to say, before anything has happened; and I believe you are making a mistake too. But supposing she did, it _could_ only be because she really loved him. She has had plenty of offers of marriage." "So she says." "Oh, Barbara, darling! That's silly. She _is_ beautiful, and clever, and nice too. Even if you don't agree entirely with the rest of us in liking her, we all do like her. And I don't think even you have not liked her really, though you think now you haven't." "Well, go on." "How am I to go on? Don't you agree that she wouldn't marry him unless she loved him?" "Oh, I suppose so; but it would be a silly sort of love, when he's so much older than she is." "Isn't that rather reflecting on him? Women do marry men a lot older than themselves, and love them devotedly. I'm sure darling Dad is worth any woman's love. He's so kind, and understanding. And he's very good-looking too, and not even elderly, as many men of his age are." "I can't imagine him falling in love, especially with somebody like her, who has been almost like we have to him." "Well, that's what makes it difficult to talk about. Perhaps he wouldn't. I can't take it for granted you are right. One can only look at it in a general sort of way; and if it did happen I don't think there would be--anything out of the way in it--certainly nothing _horrible_, as you say." Barbara's tears flowed again. "I suppose it's I who am rather horrid," she said. "I should be if there wasn't anything in it at all. But I'm almost certain there is, or I shouldn't have thought about it. Did you know that the moment you went away she went out for a walk with him?" "Yes, she told me that, and that he was feeling frightfully depressed at losing me, and she hoped she had cheered him up. If that's all, Barbara, darling, I think you are making a great deal out of a very little. I asked her to look after him, myself. Of course I didn't mean any more than to be as she always has been." "I think you might have asked me to do that. I wanted to." Caroline was stricken with compunction. "Oh, darling," she said, "I knew you would. I'd no idea of her taking your place. I know how glad he will be to have you back. And I'm going home now. I shall look after him myself." "Will you write and tell me what is happening?" "Of course I will. Everything." "If _that_ is happening, shall you try to stop it?" "What could I do to stop it?" she asked, after a pause.