Rod sat silent. He was clear-sighted enough to see what she meant. His people--and by his "people" he embraced the whole category of his class--would say quite frankly and emphatically that Mary Thorn "wouldn't do." She wasn't anybody. She had never been anywhere or met any one. In a courteous, matter-of-fact manner they would make an issue of that. They would never countenance and accept Mary Thorn without a tussle. He saw all that, but it did not seem to him vital or final. And he merely sat silent while he sought cogent reasons to show her why these harsh facts she mentioned did not matter so far as they two were concerned. Why should they be governed by exterior restraints, taboos, penalties, if they had a burning need of each other? He tried to put that into words. But the devils of perversity had entered into Mary. He could not drive them out. He sat there holding her hands, persuading, reasoning, pleading. He had a conviction that emotionally some flame in her leaped to the passionate fire within himself, and that she resisted only by some intellectual force that was stronger than his own. He could master her heart but not her will. "What do you want out of life that we can't get together better than if you go after it single-handed?" he demanded savagely, "Am I not man enough for you? Why drag in class and money and all that sort of thing. You know that doesn't count between us. We've got something--there's something in us--that pulls us together. It was there long ago when we were kids paddling around together. It's grown stronger, through four years of almost complete separation. The peculiar magic of that--whatever it is--begins to work as soon as we come together. We don't have to tell each other. We know. Don't we? Isn't it true?" She nodded, lips parted, eyes bright, looking out over the channel as if she saw more there than the running tide. "Then," he continued, "if it seems good to us to plan a future in which we shall be partners as well as lovers, why shouldn't we?" "Too soon, for one thing," she said. "You're twenty-two, Rod; I'm nineteen. I have another year in school. How do we know that what we seem to want so badly to-day will satisfy us completely to-morrow? And even if we were sure, we can't dodge facts. You couldn't just by marrying me make me a Norquay, with all the rights, privileges, and standing of the clan. Neither your family nor your friends would accept me as one of themselves. Certainly not at first. Perhaps never. Look," she continued sadly, "I don't know any one you know. Your people don't know my people--don't want to know them. It would be a struggle. You'd have to pull me up to your level, or be dragged down to mine. They'd say you were marrying out of your class, and they'd punish you in so many subtle ways. You knew Marty Graham, didn't you? Have you seen him and his wife since you came back?" Rod shook his head.