"I think he was very much attracted by you," said Sir Julian, with perfect directness, and noted against his will the instant flush of brilliant colour that the words brought to her face.
"But Mark has ideals too, you know, as well as principles. If he ever contemplated eventualities, he knew that he had no right to ask you—to——"
"To ask of me what I was prepared to give;" she finished the sentence calmly.
"Do you know what that would have involved, altogether?"
"Perhaps I do and perhaps I don't," she said indifferently. "The point is, that I was prepared to take my risks."
"In any direction?"
"In any direction," she assented, without vehemence.
"I see."
Hers might indeed be the daring of ignorance, but Sir Julian felt very little doubt that she had spoken in perfect accordance with fact, as regarded her own capabilities. One by one there filtered through his mind, and were rejected, the arguments that he knew himself entitled to use. What of morality, of Mark Easter's work, of his two children, of a future grey with unspoken possibilities for themselves and for others?
Her reckless impulse had not been put to the test; would never be put to the test.