"Rachel, did Francis Rendel...."
"Yes," said Rachel, "he asked me to marry him."
Lady Gore laid her hand on her daughter's. "What did you say to him?"
Rachel looked up quickly. "Surely you know. I told him it would be impossible."
"Impossible?" her mother repeated.
"Of course, impossible," Rachel said. "We needn't discuss it, mother dear," she went on with an effort. "You know I could not go away from you; you could not do without me. You could not, could you?" she went on imploringly. "I should be dreadfully saddened if you could."
"I should have to do without you," Lady Gore said. "I could not let you give up your happiness to mine."
"It would not be giving up my happiness to stay with you, you know that quite well," Rachel said. "On the contrary, I simply could not be happy if I felt that you needed me and that I had left you."
"Rachel, do you care for him?"
"Do I, I wonder?" Rachel said, half thinking aloud and letting herself go as one does who, having overcome the first difficulty of speech, welcomes the rapturous belief of pouring out her heart to the right listener. "I believe," she said, "that I care for him as much as I could for any one, in that way, but"—and she shook her head—"I know all the time that you come first, and that you always, always will."