"Caring nothing that she could only speak of money. Oh, don't pursue it; don't, don't! All my years have been a schooling against such things as are dear to you. There are a hundred interests in my life I have never dared even to mention to you. This home, my father's work—do they not say 'no' for me? I should be a burden to you every day; you would have nothing but contempt for me."
"If a man were fool enough to base his unhappiness on his wife's goodness—why, yes. Don't you see that I may admire all this, and yet differ altogether? Isn't it one of the reasons why I ask you to be my wife, that I know how much reality and honest faith lies behind all you do? You haven't considered that—you'll have to before it's done with. I've a habit of getting my way; you'll discover it before I am through!"
The taunt turned her patience to defiance.
"No," she said, standing up as if impatient of it all, "I shall discover nothing, Mr. Faber. I intend to marry Harry Lassett in February!"
"Ah! then I'll have to begin upon that temple at once. Have you thought about the plans of it?"
She shrugged her shoulders.
"Do not spoil my dreams—there is the bell. I think it must be Harry, for my father has a key."
She went toward the door, he watching every step she took. Was it the face of a woman going to meet her lover, the face of an ecstasy, or of a painter's dream? The prosaic man deemed it to be neither.
And yet he believed that she would marry the boy.
II