"Let me warn you," she said; "I am not the sort of woman whom you know anything about. The usual things do not attract me; I have never been in love with a man. I hope that I never shall be. And yet I think that I find my way a little further into life than most of my sex."
"You have other interests," I murmured.
"I have! What they are it is not for you to know. I am only interested in your sex so far as they are useful to me. You, if you were a different sort of man, might be very useful to me."
"At least give me the chance," I begged.
She shook her head.
"This morning," she said, "it seemed to me that I saw in one moment an epitome of your life. I saw every nerve of your body strained, I saw you wound up to a great effort. It was to catch a ball! You succeeded, I believe."
I laughed a little awkwardly.
"Yes! I caught it!" I remarked. "Success is something after all, isn't it?"
"I suppose so," she admitted. "Afterwards I spoke to your cousin about you. He told me that you lived on your estates, that you played games well, that you shot birds and rabbits, and sent to prison drunken men and poachers. 'But about his life?' I asked. 'This is his life,' your cousin answered. 'He has never gone in for a career!'"
"I suppose," I said slowly, "that this seems to you a very unambitious sort of existence!"