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‘No, that’s not logic—and I knew that before. It’s really
nothing, you know. What was it you said to yourself? You
certainly said more than that?’
Isabel reflected a moment, then answered with a ques-
tion of her own. ‘Why do you call it a remarkable act? That’s
what your mother thinks too.
‘Warburton’s such a thorough good sort; as a man, I con-
sider he has hardly a fault. And then he’s what they call here
no end of a swell. He has immense possessions, and his wife
would be thought a superior being. He unites the intrinsic
and the extrinsic advantages.’
Isabel watched her cousin as to see how far he would go.
‘I refused him because he was too perfect then. I’m not per-
fect myself, and he’s too good for me. Besides, his perfection
would irritate me.’
‘That’s ingenious rather than candid,’ said Ralph. ‘As a
fact you think nothing in the world too perfect for you.’
‘Do you think I’m so good?’
‘No, but you’re exacting, all the same, without the excuse
of thinking yourself good. Nineteen women out of twenty,
however, even of the most exacting sort, would have man-
aged to do with Warburton. Perhaps you don’t know how he
has been stalked.’
‘I don’t wish to know. But it seems to me,’ said Isabel,
‘that one day when we talked of him you mentioned odd
things in him.’
Ralph smokingly considered. ‘I hope that what I said
then had no weight with you; for they were not faults, the
things I spoke of: they were simply peculiarities of his posi-

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