"How could you know it? Nobody has told you."
"I felt sure of it from the way in which you speak of him. But I thought also that you had refused him. Perhaps I was wrong there?"
"No."
"You have refused him?"
"Yes."
"I don't see that there is very much of a story to be told, Mary."
"Don't be so unkind, Walter. There is a story, and one that troubles me. If it were not so I should not have proposed to tell you. I thought that you would give me advice, and tell me what I ought to do."
"But if you have refused him, you have done so,—no doubt rightly,—without my advice; and I am too late in the field to be of any service."
"You must let me tell my own story, and you must be good to me while I do so. I think I shouldn't tell you if I hadn't almost made up my mind; but I shan't tell you which way, and you must advise me. In the first place, though I did refuse him, the matter is still open, and he is to ask me again, if he pleases."
"He has your permission for that?"