Brent was still smiling at her, and the smile was cynical. But his tone soothed where his words would have wounded, as he went on: "A man of his sort—an average, 'there-are-two-kinds-of-women, good-and-bad' sort of man—has but one use for a woman of your sort."
"I know that," said Susan.
"Do you mind it?"
"Not much. I'd not mind it at all if I felt that I was somebody."
Brent put his hand on her shoulder. "You'll do, Miss Lenox," he said with quiet heartiness. "You may not be so big a somebody as you and I would like. But you'll count as one, all right."
She looked at him with intense appeal in her eyes. "Why?" she said earnestly. "Why do you do this?"
He smiled gravely down at her—as gravely as Brent could smile—with the quizzical suggestion never absent from his handsome face, so full of life and intelligence. "I've been observing your uneasiness," said he. "Now listen. It would be impossible for you to judge me, to understand me. You are young and as yet small. I am forty, and have lived twenty-five of my forty years intensely. So, don't fall into the error of shallow people and size me up by your own foolish little standards. Do you see what I mean?"
Susan's candid face revealed her guilt. "Yes," said she, rather humbly.
"I see you do understand," said he. "And that's a good sign. Most people, hearing what I said, would have disregarded it as merely my vanity, would have gone on with their silly judging, would have set me down as a conceited ass who by some accident had got a reputation. But to proceed—I have not chosen you on impulse. Long and patient study has made me able to judge character by the face, as a horse dealer can judge horses by looking at them. I don't need to read every line of a book to know whether it's wise or foolish, worth while or not. I don't need to know a human being for years or for hours or for minutes even, before I can measure certain things. I measured you. It's like astronomy. An astronomer wants to get the orbit of a star. He takes its position twice—and from the two observations he can calculate the orbit to the inch. I've got three observations of your orbit. Enough—and to spare."
"I shan't misunderstand again," said Susan.