"Even with the man she marries?"
"She has no intention of marrying me."
"Don't you mean, Ralph, that the lack of intention is on your side?" said the professor, his brow bent sternly. "The fault lies at your door, young man. There has been a well understood arrangement for years——"
"Between the families—yes," interrupted Ralph. "But Lorna and I never agreed.'
"How can you talk so childishly?" said Professor Endicott in much the same tone Miss Ida Nicholet used with Lorna. "It is too late to hedge now, Ralph. Be a man. Fulfil your family obligations. If the girl seems indifferent it is because you have not been sufficiently loverlike. Can't you see?"
"I see well enough; but you do not," his nephew returned bluntly. "I am quite sure Lorna cares nothing for me in that way. And I am not at all sure that I wish to marry her."
"Yet you interfere with this Degger——"
"If she was my sister I'd do that. He is a scurrilous scoundrel."
"Of course," was Professor Endicott's thoughtful comment. "I presume Lorna will attract plenty of such fortune hunters until you and she let it be publicly announced that you are engaged."
Ralph's expression changed. He wagged his head in a regretful negative.