"I understand," he said; "I quite understand. When you said that you loved me, loved me with all your heart and soul, you meant that you loved Drake Selbie, the heir of Angleford, the prospective owner of Anglemere and Lord Angleford's money; and now that my uncle has married, and that he may have a child which will rob me of the title and the money, you draw back. You do not ask whether I have enough, you do not offer to make any sacrifice. You just—jilt me!"
"You put it very harshly, Drake," she said, with a frown.
"I put it very truly and correctly," he said. "Can you deny it? You cannot! The man who sits here beside you is quite a different man to the one to whom you had plighted your troth. He is the same in bone and body and muscle and sinew, but he doesn't happen to be Lord Angleford's heir. And so you throw him over. No doubt you are right. It is the way of the world in which you and I have been bred and trained."
"You are very cruel, Drake," she murmured, touching her eyes with a lace handkerchief, too costly and elaborate for anything but ornament.
"I just speak the truth," he said. "I don't blame you. You are bred in the same world as myself. We are both products of this modern fin de siècle. To marry me would be a mistake; you decline to make it. I have only to bow to your decision. I accept your refusal. After this present moment you and I are friends only; not strangers; men and women in our set are never strangers. But I pass out of your life from this moment. Go back to the Seagull with Archie and Mrs. Horn-Wallis, and find—as I trust you will—a better man than I am."
She rose rather pale, but perfectly self-possessed.
"I—I am glad you take it so easily, Drake," she said. "You don't blame me, do you? I couldn't run against father, could I? You know how poor we are. I must make a good marriage, and—and——"
"And so it is 'good-by,'" he said.
He looked so stern, so self-contained, that her self-possession forsook her for a moment, and she stood biting softly at her underlip and looking by turns at the ultramarine sea and the stern face of the lover whom she was discarding. He held out his hand again.
"Good-by, Luce," he said. "You have taught me a lesson."