"I'm going to try to be a big woman," said Tony softly, "a strong, brave woman; and I don't want to think sentimental rot about a perfect knight and a spotless hero and all that. I want to be a man's fighting comrade--I want to feel he can't do without me. It was you who first told me that I must take men as I find them--but not leave them so." "Tony, if only I thought there was any good in him----" "I tell you there's a mine of good in him. But he's never had a chance till now. Our engagement is to be a very long one, and already I can see a difference in him. It's not I that have done it--it's his love for me. And all the sorrow he went through, when he thought he'd lost me, seems to have made him gentler and humbler somehow. Quentin has suffered dreadfully"--there was a little click in her throat--"and he wants so much to be good and pure and true. And I've promised to help him, by believing that he can and will do better." His own words were being mercilessly fired back at him. He remembered how he had first breathed them to her, full of hope and entreaty. In the face of such artillery his rout was complete. "Forgive him, Tony!" he cried. "Forgive him! But oh, forgive me, too!" They had reached the gate of Redpale Farm. He stopped--he would go no further. "Tony--forgive me too." The words broke from his lips in an exceeding bitter cry. "Forgive you!--what for?" "For a great deal--for all you know of, and for the more you don't know." "Of course I forgive you--but I thank you most." "No, you must forgive me most--are you sure that you forgive me for what you don't know as well as for what you know?" "Quite sure"--her voice trembled a little, for he was beginning to frighten her. "Then good-bye." "Good-bye. I--I hope I haven't brought you very far out of your way." He muttered something unintelligible, pulled off his cap, and left her. He walked quickly, pricked on by a discovery which was also a triumph. Quentin Lowe had not taken Tony from him after all. The Tony he loved had never known Quentin Lowe, she had been no man's friend but Nigel Furlonger's--and so much his friend that when he had been taken from her she would not stay without him, but herself had gone away. Quentin Lowe loved a beautiful woman--proud and sweet and assured, with just a dash of the prig about her. Nigel had never loved this woman, he had loved a little girl--and the little girl who had been his comrade in the Kentish lanes and the ruins of Brambletye, would never be any man's but his.