Margot (sitting on the sofa beside him):  “Won’t you speak to me and tell me all about it?”

Peter put down his book, and looking at me steadily, said very slowly: 

“I’d rather not speak to a liar!”

I stood up as if I had been shot and said: 

“How dare you say such a thing!”

Peter:  “You lied to me.”

Margot:  “When?”

Peter:  “You know perfectly well!  And you are in love!  You know you are.  Will you deny it?”

“Oh! it’s this that worries you, is it?” said I sweetly.  “What would you say if I told you I was not?”

Peter:  “I would say you were lying again.”

Margot:  “Have I ever lied to you, Peter?”

Peter:  “How can I tell? (Shrugging his shoulders) You have lied twice, so I presume since I’ve been away you’ve got into the habit of it.”

Margot:  “Peter!”

Peter:  “A man doesn’t scream and put his arm round a woman, as D—­ ly did at the races to-day, unless he is in love.  Will you tell me who paid my debt, please?”

Margot:  “No, I won’t.”

Peter:  “Was it D—­ly?”

Margot:  “I shan’t tell you.  I’m not Sam Lewis; and, since I’m such a liar, is it worth while asking me these stupid questions?”

Peter:  “Ah, Margot, this is the worst blow of my life!  I see you are deceiving me.  I know who paid my debt now.”

Margot:  “Then why ask me? ...”

Peter:  “When I went to India I had never spoken to D—­ly in my life.  Why should he have paid my debts for me?  You had much better tell me the simple truth and get it over:  it’s all settled and you’re going to marry him.”

Margot:  “Since I’ve got into the way of lying, you might spare yourself and me these vulgar questions.”

Peter (seizing my hands in anguish):  “Say you aren’t going to marry him ... tell me, tell me it’s not true.”

Margot:  “Why should I?  He has never asked me to.”

After this the question of matrimony was bound to come up between us.  The first time it was talked of, I was filled with anxiety.  It seemed to put a finish to the radiance of our friendship and, worse than that, it brought me up against my father, who had often said to me:  “You will never marry Flower; you must marry your superior.”

Peter himself, in a subconscious way, had become aware of the situation.  One evening, riding home, he said: 

“Margie, do you see that?”

He pointed to the spire of the Melton Church and added: 

“That is what you are in my life.  I am not worth the button on your boot!”

To which I replied: 

“I would not say that, but I cannot find goodness for two.”

I was profundly unhappy.  To live for ever with a man who was incapable of loving any one but himself and me, who was without any kind of moral ambition and chronically indifferent to politics and religion, was a nightmare.