"When I was not very much older than you, in India," she went on, "I was like you, little more than a child. I was not clever as you are--I never have been clever, my dear, but I was beautiful, Joan, really beautiful. Do you remember, you used to think me beautiful?" The voice grew wistful and paused, then went on without waiting for a reply. "I had no mother to tell me anything, and what I learnt about things I learnt from other girls of my own age; we speculated together and came to many wrong conclusions." Another pause. "About the facts of life, I mean--about men and marriage and--what it all meant. Men made love to me, dearest, they admired your mother in those days, but their love-making was restrained and respectful, as the love-making of a man should be to a young unmarried girl, and----" she hesitated, "it told me nothing--nothing, Joan, of what was to come. Then I met your father, I met James, and he proposed to me and I married him. He was good looking then, in a way--at least I thought so--and a wonderful horseman, and that appealed to me, as you may guess, for we Routledges have always been fond of horses. Well, dear, that's what I want to tell you about--not the horses, my married life, I mean." She went on quickly now, the words tumbled over each other, her voice gathered volume, growing sharp and resentful. As she spoke she felt overwhelmed with the relief that came with this crude recital of long hidden miseries. Joan watched her, astonished; watched the refined, worn face, the delicate, peevish lips that were uttering such incongruous things. Something of her mother's sense of outrage entered into her as she listened, filling her with resentment and pity for this handicapped and utterly self-centred creature, for whom the natural laws had worked so unpropitiously. She thought bitterly of her father, breathing heavily on his pillows upstairs, of his lack of imagination, his legally sanctified self-indulgence, his masterful yet stupid mind, but she only said: "Why have you told me all this, dearest?" Mrs. Ogden took her hand. "Why have I told you? Oh, Joan, because of Richard Benson, because I think you're falling in love for the first time." Joan looked at her in amazement. "You think that?" she asked. "Well, isn't it so? Joan, tell me quickly, isn't it so?" "No," said Joan emphatically, "it isn't. Richard asked me to marry him to-day and I refused." Mrs. Ogden burst into tears; her weeping was loud and unrestrained; she hid her head on the girl's shoulder. "Oh, Joan--my Joan----" she sobbed. "Oh, Joan, I am so glad!" Now she did not care what she said, the years of unwilling restraint melted away; she clung to the girl fiercely, possessively, murmuring words of endearment. Joan took her in her arms and rocked her like a child. "There, there!" she whispered.