‘My views are not ignoble,’ he murmured.

‘I hope not.  But they are the views of a man.’

‘Man and woman ought to see life with much the same eyes.’

’Ought they?  Perhaps so.  I am not sure.  But they never will in our time.’

’Individuals may.  The man and woman who have thrown away prejudice and superstition.  You and I, for instance.’

’Oh, those words have such different meanings.  In your judgment I should seem full of idle prejudice.’

She liked this conversation; he read pleasure in her face, saw in her eyes a glint of merry defiance.  And his pulses throbbed the quicker for it.

‘You have a prejudice against me, for instance.’

‘Pray, did you go to the Savoy?’ inquired Rhoda absently.

’I have no intention of talking about the Savoy, Miss Nunn.  It is teacup time, but as yet we have the room to ourselves.’

Rhoda went and rang the bell.

‘The teacups shall come at once.’

He laughed slightly, and looked at her from beneath drooping lids.  Rhoda went on with talk of trifles, until the tea was brought and she had given a cup.  Having emptied it at two draughts, he resumed his former leaning position.

’Well, you were saying that you had a prejudice against me.  Of course my cousin Mary is accountable for that.  Mary has used me rather ill.  Before ever you saw me, I represented to your mind something very disagreeable indeed.  That was too bad of my cousin.’

Rhoda, sipping her tea, had a cold, uninterested expression.

‘I didn’t know of this,’ he proceeded, ’when we met that day in the gardens, and when I made you so angry.

‘I wasn’t disposed to jest about what had happened.’

’But neither was I. You quite misunderstood me.  Will you tell me how that unpleasantness came to an end?’

‘Oh yes.  I admitted that I had been ill-mannered and obstinate.’

’How delightful!  Obstinate?  I have a great deal of that in my character.  All the active part of my life was one long fit of obstinacy.  As a lad I determined on a certain career, and I stuck to it in spite of conscious unfitness, in spite of a great deal of suffering, out of sheer obstinacy.  I wonder whether Mary ever told you that.’

‘She mentioned something of the kind once.’

’You could hardly believe it, I dare say?  I am a far more reasonable being now.  I have changed in so many respects that I hardly know my old self when I look back on it.  Above all, in my thoughts about women.  If I had married during my twenties I should have chosen, as the average man does, some simpleton—­with unpleasant results.  If I marry now, it will be a woman of character and brains.  Marry in the legal sense I never shall.  My companion must be as independent of forms as I am myself.’

Rhoda looked into her teacup for a second or two, then said with a smile,—­