“She cares for you?” asked Trenchard. “Yes,” said Philip quite simply. “Well, I’m damned,” said Trenchard. This was not so rude as it appeared to be. He was not thinking about Philip at all—only about Katherine. She had fallen in love, she, Katherine, the staid, humorous, comfortable companion. He had not realised, until now, that he had always extracted much complacent comfort from the belief that she cared for him more than for any other member of the family. He did not know that every individual member extracted from Katherine the same comfort. He looked at Philip. What did she see in the man to lead her to such wild courses? He was nice enough to look at, to listen to—but to love? It seemed to him that his quiet daughter must have been indulging in melodrama. “Why, you know,” he cried at last, “it never entered my head—Katherine’s marrying anybody. She’s very young—you’re very young too.” “I don’t know,” said Philip, “I’m thirty—lots of men have families by then.” “No, but you’re young though—both of you,” persisted Trenchard. “I don’t think I want Katherine to marry anybody.” “Isn’t that rather selfish?” said Philip. “Yes. I suppose it is,” said Trenchard, laughing, “but it’s natural.” “It isn’t, you see,” said Philip eagerly, “as though I wanted to take her away to Russia or in any way deprive you of her. I know how much she is to all of you. She’s sure to marry some day, isn’t she? and it’s much better that she should marry someone who’s going to settle down here and live as you all do than someone who’d go right off with her.” “It’s all right, I shouldn’t let him,” said Trenchard. He bent his eyes upon the eager lover, and again said to himself that he liked the young man. It would certainly be much pleasanter that Katherine should care about a fine healthy young fellow, a good companion after dinner, a good listener with a pleasant sense of humour, than that she should force into the heart of the family some impossibility—not that Katherine was likely to care about impossibilities, but you never knew; the world to-day was so full of impossibilities.... “I think we’ll send for Katherine,” he said. He rang the bell, Rocket came, Katherine was summoned. As they waited Trenchard delivered himself of a random, half-humorous, half-conscious, half-unconscious discourse: