"I think so. Dear Mrs. Roden, do not look at me like that. If I do not say more to tell you immediately it is because I am not perhaps quite sure;—not sure, at any rate, of the reasons I may have to give. I will come to you to-morrow, and then I will tell you."
There was room then at any rate for hope! If the girl had not quite resolved to grasp at the high destiny offered to her, it was still her friend's duty to say something that might influence her.
"Marion, dear!"
"Say all that you think, Mrs. Roden. Surely you know that I know that whatever may come from you will come in love. I have no mother, and to whom can I go better than to you to fill a mother's place?"
"Dear Marion, it is thus I feel towards you. What I would say to you I would say to my own child. There are great differences in the ranks of men."
"I have felt that."
"And though I do in my honest belief think that the best and honestest of God's creatures are not always to be found among so-called nobles, yet I think that a certain great respect should be paid to those whom chance has raised to high places."
"Do I not respect him?"
"I hope so. But perhaps you may not show it best by loving him."
"As to that, it is a matter in which one can, perhaps, hardly control oneself. If asked for love it will come from you like water from a fountain. Unless it be so, then it cannot come at all."