The girl frowned across at her grandfather reflectively.
"Do you mean by that," she asked, after a little silence--"do you mean that you think I am likely to be moved by sheer ambition and nothing else in arranging my life? I've never thought of myself as a very ambitious person."
"Let us substitute for ambition common-sense," said old David. "I think you have a great deal of common-sense for a woman--and so young a woman. How old are you by-the-way? Twenty-two? Yes, to be sure. I think you have great common-sense and appreciation of values. And I think you're singularly free of the emotionalism that so often plays hob with them all. People with common-sense fall in love in the right places."
"I don't quite like the sound of it," said Miss Benham. "Perhaps I am rather ambitious--I don't know. Yes, perhaps. I should like to play some part in the world, I don't deny that. But--am I as cold as you say? I doubt it very much. I doubt that."
"You're twenty-two," said her grandfather, "and you have seen a good deal of society in several capitals. Have you ever fallen in love?"
Oddly, the face of Ste. Marie came before Miss Benham's eyes as if she had summoned it there. But she frowned a little and shook her head, saying:
"No, I can't say that I have. But that means nothing. There's plenty of time for that. And you know," she said, after a pause--"you know I'm rather sure I could fall in love--pretty hard. I'm sure of that. Perhaps I have been waiting. Who knows?"
"Aye, who knows?" said David. He seemed all at once to lose interest in the subject, as old people often do without apparent reason, for he remained silent for a long time, puffing at the long black cigar or rolling it absently between his fingers. After awhile he laid it down in a metal dish which stood at his elbow, and folded his lean hands before him over the invalid's table. He was still so long that at last his granddaughter thought he had fallen asleep, and she began to rise from her seat, taking care to make no noise; but at that the old man stirred and put out his hand once more for the cigar. "Was young Richard Hartley at your dinner-party?" he asked, and she said:
"Yes. Oh yes, he was there. He and M. Ste. Marie came together, I believe. They are very close friends."
"Another idler," growled old David. "The fellow's a man of parts--and a man of family. What's he idling about here for? Why isn't he in Parliament, where he belongs?"