Miss Barhyte raised a handkerchief to her lips and bit the shred of cambric with the disinvoltura of an heiress.
“Why is it,” she queried, “why is it that marriage ever was invented? Why cannot a girl accept help from a man without becoming his wife?”
Mr. Incoul was about to reply that many do, but he felt that such a reply would be misplaced, and he called a platitude to his rescue. “There are wives and wives,” he said.
“That is it,” the girl returned, the color mounting to her cheeks; “if I could but be to you one of the latter.”
He stared at her wonderingly, almost hopefully. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“Did you ever read ‘Eugénie Grandet’?”
“No,” he answered, “I never have.”
“Well, I read it years ago. It is, I believe, the only one of Balzac’s novels that young girls are supposed to read. It is tiresome indeed; I had almost forgotten it, but yesterday I remembered enough of the story to help me to come to some decision. In thinking the matter over and over again as I have done ever since I last saw you it has seemed that I could not become your wife unless you were willing to make the same agreement with me that Eugénie Grandet’s husband made with her.”
“What was the nature of that agreement?”