He drew a long breath. "You make me feel as if I were going into a very doubtful battle," he said thoughtfully.
"It is a very doubtful battle. It certainly will be a hard, and probably a long one, and you will lose it if you don't keep cool."
"I can be very firm, I suppose."
"Yes, as firm and decided as you please, as long as you are quiet and gentlemanly in your words. Let me say one thing more," she added, very gravely. "If you enter on this affair, and then, in any kind of weakness or fickleness, give it up, I shall despise you, and so will all in this city who know about it. Count the cost. I'm too true a Southerner to look at you again if you trifle with a Southern girl. Your father will offer you great inducements to abandon this folly, as he will term it."
He flushed deeply, but only said, in quiet emphasis, "If I ever give up, except for reasons satisfactory to you, I shall despise myself far more than you can despise me."
"And you give me your word that you will keep your temper to the very end?"
"Yes, Heaven helping me, I will."
"Heaven speed you then, my friend."