Brooks looked at her for a moment amazed beside himself with wonder and self-reproach.

“Mary,” he said, quietly, “I give you my word that nothing which I have said this evening has the least connection with that afternoon.  I give you my word that not for a moment have I thought of it in connection with what I have said to you to-night.”

She looked at him steadfastly, and her eyes were full of things which he could not understand.

“When did you make up your mind—­to ask me this?”

He pointed to the little table where they had been sitting.

Only a few minutes ago.  I confess it was an impulse.  I think that I realized as we sat there how dear you had grown to me, Mary—­how dull life was without you.”

“You say these things to me,” she exclaimed, “when all the time you love another woman.”

He started a little.  She smiled bitterly as she saw the shadow on his face.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” she said, deliberately, “that you love Sybil Caroom.  Is it not true?”

His head drooped a little.  He had never asked himself even so much as this.  He was face to face now with all the concentrated emotions which lately had so much disturbed his life.  The problem which he had so sedulously avoided was forced upon him ruthlessly, with almost barbaric simplicity.

“I do not know,” he answered, vaguely.  “I have never asked myself.  I do not wish to ask myself.  Why do you speak of her?  She is not of our world, the world to which I want to belong.  I want to forget her.”

“You are a little mad to-night, my friend,” Mary said.  “To-morrow you will feel differently.  If Sybil Caroom cares for you, what does it matter which world she belongs to?  She is not the sort of girl to be bound by old-fashioned prejudices.  But I do not understand you at all to-night.  You are not yourself.  I think that you are—­a little cruel.”  “Cruel?” he repeated.

Her face darkened.

“Oh, it is only natural,” she said, with a note of suppressed passion in her how tone.  “It is just the accursed egotism of your sex.  What right have you to make us suffer so—­to ask me to marry you—­and sit by my side and wonder whether you care for another woman?  Can’t you see how humiliating it all is?  It is an insult to ask a woman to marry you to cure your loneliness, to make you a home to settle your indecision.  It is an insult to ask a woman to marry you for any reason except that you care for her more than any other woman in the world, and can tell her so trustfully, eagerly.  Please to put me in a cab at once, and never speak of these things again.”

She was half-way across the lawn before he could stop her, her head thrown back, carrying herself proudly and well, moving as it seemed to him with a sort of effortless dignity wholly in keeping with the vigour of her words.  He obeyed her literally.  There was nothing else for him to do.  His slight effort to join her in the cab she firmly repulsed, holding out her hand and speaking a few cheerful words of thanks for her evening’s entertainment.  And when the cab rolled away Brooks felt lonelier than ever.