"I don't think I'm cynical, Millicent. I don't feel so. I meant only to be amusing in talking of something that always amuses me. It has always seemed to me funny that young men should be so desperately afraid of us young women even when we are trembling in holy awe of them. I've seen so much of that sort of thing. Sometimes it becomes tragical and spoils lives that do not deserve to be spoiled. I knew one case in which it was saved from doing that only by the impertinent interference of a very peculiar young woman." "Oh, it's a story," exclaimed Millicent, "and a love story at that. Tell it please." "It isn't much of a story, but I'll tell it. I had a governess whom I loved dearly and with reason. She taught me all I know, and--" "She must have been a woman of wonderful acquirements then." "She was and is, but such culture as I possess is not an adequate indication of her learning or of her capacity to teach. I owe her all I ever learned; I owe to my own indifference all the defects in my education." There was something in Margaret's tone as she said this, that attracted Millicent's attention. "She is certainly cynical, self-accusative, unsatisfied," she reflected. "She isn't happy, and it behooves you, Millicent Danvers, to find out the cause and remedy the condition if you can." Without uttering that thought, she said: "You aren't telling me the love story, Margaret, and I'm eager to hear that before I let Carter Barksdale fall in love with me. You see I'm young and wholly inexperienced, and I naturally want to learn how such things are conducted." Margaret laughed lowly, as she thought: "A girl like you doesn't need lessons in the conduct of love affairs. To such as you, love,--like 'to write and read, comes by nature.'" Then she resumed her story: