"No." She hesitated, as if to consider. Then went on, "It is not so much your courage which I should have questioned, as the direction in which it has been shown. It is a sufficiently rare quality to make it unfortunate that any of it should be wasted. How much of it has been wasted you know even better than I do."
"I understand you. I thank you, not only for what you say, but also for what you leave unsaid. I am not only going to turn over a new leaf, Miss Jardine; I am going to commence a new volume. Though I shall always feel, myself, that you have commenced it for me."
"I am content, so long as it is a volume of a certain kind."
What did she mean? I seldom knew quite what she did mean. She puzzled me almost as much as her father. She was not like the average girl one bit. As she looked at me with her curiously smiling eyes, with the suggestion of strength which they conveyed to me, I felt that it was probable that she knew much more of the contents of my volume, the one which I claimed to be just closing, than I was likely to know of hers.
"Do you know, Miss Jardine, that you are making of me a proselyte."
"In what sense?"
"I have never, hitherto, believed in the influence of women. You are making of me a believer."
"That certain women have influence over certain men I think there can be no doubt whatever. I have influence over you; you have influence over me. Only"--she stopped my speaking with a movement of her fan--"I should be on my guard against your influence over me until I felt that my influence over you had produced certain results."
"I suppose that any attempts on my part to guard against your influence would be vain."
"You would not attempt to make them. You are not that kind of man."