But now—! Wilbraham mentally shook himself. Was he receiving instructions from Harry—and almost inclined to accept them submissively?
The little spurt to his pride took him a trifle farther than he had wished to go. "I don't think it's a matter for me to decide on, apart from your grandmother," he said.
Harry turned a surprised face on him. "No, it's for me to decide on," he said. "By and by I shall tell Granny—of course. But I don't in the least know when it will be. There's nothing to show yet."
The phrase struck Wilbraham oddly. Harry had used it once or twice to him before. "One has to decide upon things with one's brain," he said, "and out of one's experience—important things that may affect one's life. They can't be left to impulse."
"The two go together, I suppose," said Harry, almost with indifference.
It was one of those little speeches upon which Viola would hang as containing the quintessence of wisdom. She might not have understood this speech, but Wilbraham did, and it affected him profoundly. Here was that rarest of characters—one who had never played with his impulses, to give them scope beyond the guidance of his reason. He could trust his impulses because their springs were controlled.
"Shall we go on?" said Harry, rising.
Wilbraham rose too, slowly, after a pause of reflection, and they walked on. Viola's name was not mentioned again between them.
CHAPTER XVI
DILEMMA