They were both silent in a painful silence.
"Well, mother?" he asked at last.
"If it's something you've quite made up mind to----"
"It is!"
"And if you've already spoken to her----"
"I had to do that first, of course."
"There would be no use of my saying anything, even if I disliked it."
"You do dislike it!"
"No--no! I can't say that. Of course I should have preferred it if you had chosen some nice girl among those that you had been brought up with--some friend or associate of your sisters, whose people we had known----"
"Yes, I understand that, and I can assure you that I haven't been indifferent to your feelings. I have tried to consider them from the first, and it kept me hesitating in a way that I'm ashamed to think of; for it wasn't quite right towards--others. But your feelings and my sisters' have been in my mind, and if I couldn't yield to what I supposed they must be, entirely----"