Gwenna regarded her with envy. Leslie spoke of what should be the eighth wonder of the world, the making or rejecting of a man's life, as if it were an everyday affair.
"Don't look so unflatteringly surprised, Taffy. Strictly pretty I may not be. But a scrupulously neat and lady-like appearance," mocked Leslie, putting out a long arm in a faded-silk sleeve that was torn at the cuff, "has often (they tell one) done more to win husbands than actual good looks!"
Little Gwenna said, startled, "You aren't—aren't going to let Mr. Swayne be your husband, are you?"
"I don't know," said Leslie, reflectively, a little wearily. "I don't know, yet. He's fat—but of course that would come off after I'd worried him for a year or so. He's flabby. He's rather like Kipling's person whose 'rooms at College was beastly!' but he's good-natured, and his people were all right, and, Taffy, he's delightfully well-off. And when one's turned twenty-six, one does want to be sure of what's coming. One must have some investment that'll bring in one's frocks and one's railway-fares and one's proper setting."
"There are other things," protested little Gwenna with a warm memory of that moment's clasping on the heights that afternoon. "There are things one wants more."
"Not me."
"Ah! That's because you don't know them," declared Gwenna, flushed.
And at that the elder girl gave a very rueful laugh.
"Not know them? I've known them too well," she admitted. "Listen, Taffy, I'll tell you the sort of girl I am. I'm afraid there are plenty of us about."
She sighed, and went on with a little nod.