"You're quite right, Lily," said Elmore, with a rising respect for the girl.
"Professor Elmore, can you believe that, with all the attentions I've had, I've never seriously thought of getting married as the end of it all?" she asked, looking him freely in the eyes.
"I can't understand it,—no man could, I suppose,—but I do believe it. Mrs. Elmore has often told me the same thing."
"And this—letter—it—means marriage."
"That and nothing else. The man who wrote it would consider himself cruelly wronged if you accepted his attentions without the distinct purpose of marrying him."
She drew a deep breath. "I shall have to ask you to write a refusal for me." But still she did not give him the letter.
"Have you made up your mind to that?"
"I can't make up my mind to anything else."
Elmore walked unhappily back and forth across the room. "I have seen something of international marriages since I've been in Europe," he said. "Sometimes they succeed; but generally they're wretched failures. The barriers of different race, language, education, religion,—they're terrible barriers. It's very hard for a man and woman to understand each other at the best; with these differences added, it's almost a hopeless case."
"Yes; that's what Mrs. Elmore said."