'What did you think about at sixteen?'
Her look changed.
'I had mother then,'—she said simply.
'Ah! then—I'm afraid you've no right to sit in judgment upon us. Alice and I had no mother—no one but ourselves. Of course all our relations and friends disapproved of us. But that somehow has never made much difference to either of us. Does it make much difference to you? Do you mind if people praise or blame you? What does it matter what anybody thinks? Who can know anything about you but yourself?—Eh?'
He poured out his questions in a hurry, one tumbling over the other. And he had already begun to bite the inevitable stalk of grass. Lucy as usual was conscious both of intimidation and attraction—she felt him at once absurd and magnetic.
'I'm sure we're meant to care what people think,' she said, with spirit.
'It helps us. It keeps us straight.'
His eyes flashed.
'You think so? Then we disagree entirely—absolutely—and in toto! I don't want to be approved—outside my literary work any way—I want to be happy. It never enters my head to judge other people—why should they judge me?'
'But—but'—Then she laughed out, remembering his book, and his political escapade, 'Aren't you always judging other people?'
'Fighting them—yes! That's another matter. But I don't give myself superior airs. I don't judge—I just love—and hate.'