‘No.  But—­’

‘But?’

‘But suppose I—­’

She rose, crossed to him, seated herself on his knee and put an arm about his neck.  Before she had spoken another word, Tarrant understood; the smile on his face lost its spontaneity; a bitter taste seemed to distort his lips.

‘You think—­you are afraid—­’

He heard a monosyllable, and sat silent.  This indeed had not entered into his calculations; but why not?  He could hardly say; he had ignored the not unimportant detail, as it lurked among possibilities.  Perhaps had willingly ignored it, as introducing a complication oppressive to his indolence, to his hodiernal philosophy.  And now he arraigned mother-nature, the very divinity whom hitherto he had called upon to justify him.  All at once he grew cold to Nancy.  The lulled objections to matrimony awoke in him again; again he felt that he had made a fool of himself.  Nancy was better than he had thought; he either loved her, or felt something towards her, not easily distinguishable from love.  His inferior she remained, but not in the sense he had formerly attributed to the word.  Her mind and heart excelled the idle conception he had formed of them.  But Nancy was not his wife, as the world understands that relation; merely his mistress, and as a mistress he found her charming, lovable.  What she now hinted at, would shatter the situation.  Tarrant thought not of the peril to her material prospects; on that score he was indifferent, save in so far as Mr Lord’s will helped to maintain their mutual independence.  But he feared for his liberty, in the first place, and in the second, abhorred the change that must come over Nancy herself.  Nancy a mother—­he repelled the image, as though it degraded her.

Delicacy, however, constrained him to a disguise of these emotions.  He recognised the human sentiments that should have weighed with him; like a man of cultivated intelligence, he admitted their force, their beauty.  None the less, a syllable on Nancy’s lips had arrested the current of his feelings, and made him wish again that he had been either more or less a man of honour down at Teignmouth.

‘And yet,’ he said to himself, ’could I have resisted an appeal for marriage now?  That comes of being so confoundedly humane.  It’s a marvel that I didn’t find myself married to some sheer demirep long ago.’

Nancy was speaking.

‘Will it make you love me less?’

‘I have always refused to prophesy about love,’ he answered, with forced playfulness.

‘But you wouldn’t—­you wouldn’t?’

‘We should find ourselves in a very awkward position.’

‘I know,’ said Nancy hurriedly.  ’I can’t see what would be done.  But you seem colder to me all at once, Lionel.  Surely it oughtn’t to—­ to turn you away from me.  Perhaps I am mistaken.’

This referred to the alarming possibility, and Tarrant caught at hope.  Yes, she might be mistaken; they wouldn’t talk about it; he shook it away.