‘I am depending on it,’ I said, and let my eyes follow the little blue waves that chased past the hand-rail. ‘We are making very good speed, aren’t we? Thirty-five knots since last night at ten. Are you in the sweep?’
‘I never bet on the way out—can’t afford it. Am I old-fashioned?’ he insisted.
‘Probably. Men are very slow in changing their philosophy about women. I fancy their idea of the maternal relation is firmest fixed of all.’
‘We see it a beatitude!’ he cried.
‘I know,’ I said wearily, ‘and you never modify the view.’
Dacres contemplated the portion of the deck that lay between us. His eyes were discreetly lowered, but I saw embarrassment and speculation and a hint of criticism in them.
‘Tell me more about it,’ said he.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake don’t be sympathetic!’ I exclaimed. ‘Lend me a little philosophy instead. There is nothing to tell. There she is and there I am, in the most intimate relation in the world, constituted when she is twenty-one and I am forty.’ Dacres started slightly at the ominous word; so little do men realize that the women they like can ever pass out of the constated years of attraction. ‘I find the young lady very tolerable, very creditable, very nice. I find the relation atrocious. There you have it. I would like to break the relation into pieces,’ I went on recklessly, ‘and throw it into the sea. Such things should be tempered to one. I should feel it much less if she occupied another cabin, and would consent to call me Elizabeth or Jane. It is not as if I had been her mother always. One grows fastidious at forty—new intimacies are only possible then on a basis of temperament—’
I paused; it seemed to me that I was making excuses, and I had not the least desire in the world to do that.
‘How awfully rough on the girl!’ said Dacres Tottenham.