He could see his own home—his return to it. He could see his mother and feel the hostility that sprang to life the instant her eyes rested on Andree. He could read his mother’s thoughts ... and his father’s. There was the one bright spot. He could see his father kissing Andree diffidently and patting her hand and telling her how glad he was to see her and asking how his son had ever managed to capture such a pretty girl.... There would be no doubt of her welcome at his father’s hands.... But his mother—that cold hostility, that hard-eyed suspicion!... And then, when she had him alone, the catechism he would undergo, and the resentment and jealousy she would exhibit.... He could see his friends and the neighbors of his childhood with their crass curiosity and their hints and whispers.... He knew their every thought ... could see their eyes fixed on Andree speculatively ... some of them hopefully! It was that he would have to take her, too.... And then, if the story should come out!... But that would be little worse.... Perhaps he exaggerated, perhaps he saw his old friends and acquaintances in characters which were not truly theirs. There might have been more charity among them than he perceived, more kindness and less narrowness and insularity.... But he did not see them except as he feared they might be. What of himself? How would he feel to find himself married to a girl who had violated the standards of Plymouth Rock, even though he had been the one to profit by that violation?... Even if none ever found it out but himself? He would know it.... It would constantly be recurring to him—or would it not? He did not know. The thing did not affect him now. It did not make Andree the less desirable and lovable and _good_. Perhaps that would persist—but his prejudices were deep-seated, had their roots in an older generation and were not lightly to be cast out.... But he loved her.... In spite of all that he saw and felt and feared, he knew that he loved her, and that to know she was removed forever from his life would be to lose a wonderful thing that he could not bear to lose.... The decision lay between love and expediency.... If only he could live in Paris and never return to America! How easy it would be then! “Will you miss me?” he asked, clumsily. She stirred in his arms and held her face up to his. “I shall be ver’ sad,” she said. “Suppose—suppose something should happen to me and I could never come back?” She held his hand very tightly. “I do not know,” she said. “I cannot to theenk of that.” He must decide.... He must decide.... But he was afraid; he _could not_ decide—not now, not yet.... There were hours ahead of them. She asked nothing of him, made no demands, but waited, waited. He could feel her waiting, hoping for some word, some assurance that he was not going to desert her forever, that he would come back to her—and he could not give that assurance ... not yet.