"If you have to ask, you'd never understand."
Tharol Sen shuddered. "I don't understand anything about you. Who you are. Why you hate us so—"
"Who says I do?"
"Roper. He says—"
"Never mind what he says. I suppose there's no use trying to convince you that he never tells the truth if a lie will serve as well. He's a known criminal, a thief and swindler, and even a murderer. A man who abandoned his wife on Earth, and a small child he's never seen. Frankly, I don't understand you, and I'm not sure I'd want to. You're quite determined to marry him?"
"Quite." Tharol Sen stiffened.
"Well, that's your hard luck. He's no good. No good for you, or anyone. Not even for himself."
"Nothing you can say matters. He told me about that wife. She's too sane, too normal and practical for him. He thinks that I—"
Torry was not listening. Contrasting Tharol Sen with Rose, he was almost inclined to agree with Roper, and envy him such a loyal and spirited defender. The girl was pure-blood Martian, with all the eery beauty of the strange race. She was young but vibrantly alive and human. There was emotional depth in her, and a passionate savagery that might inspire a man to passion, or to devotion, depending upon the man.
"Besides," finished Tharol Sen, "there is no other man like him."