“The failures are those who forget—the woman who forgets that she is a woman and seeks to do the man’s work—the man who forgets that he is a man and treats the woman as if she were the same as himself. Oh, here we are talking of the philosophy of life when we should be living. But that’s the way of philosophy: it keeps a man learning the best way to live, and by the time he has learnt it it is time for him to die.”
“Hang up philosophy and give us life, say I. Dear girl, you have made me happy and—hungry. I left my bed at four this morning, and now it’s past seven.”
“You will come with me and have breakfast. I wonder if any man up to this day ever asked a girl to marry him before breakfast.”
“I wonder. But a chap feels so much fresher in the early morning, I think it should be tried more frequently.”
“It was a bold experiment, Jack. But it might only succeed when carried out in connection with the dairy industry.”
“That is how you come to be up so early. Shall I have a chance of seeing your dad if I go with you? I suppose a dad has always to be reckoned with.”
“No one has to be reckoned with except myself in this matter. I am myself, and I know myself, and will obey myself and none other this time—this time.”
She spoke with some vehemence, and her last sentence was uttered with a touch of bitterness. He knew what she meant. Providence had come to her rescue once, but a second interposition on her behalf was too much to expect. He could appreciate her feeling.
“You will not have to meet my father until you please,” she said. “Just now he is miles away—at Galsworthy. We shall be alone.”
“I’ll not shudder at the prospect,” said he. “We can’t have everything in this world, can we?”