Deal fairly with him, child, and if anon you find you cannot truly love him, then tell him so.

But tell him kindly and frankly, instead of using him as you are doing." She was silent a moment, and in their poignancy her feelings went very near to anger.

Presently: "I would, Sir Crispin, you could hear him talk of you," said she.
"He talks ill, not a doubt of it, and like enough he has good cause." "Yet you saved his life." The words awoke Crispin, the philosopher of love, to realities.

He recalled the circumstances of his saving Kenneth, and the price the boy was to pay for that service; and it suddenly came to him that it was wasted breath to plead Kenneth's cause with Cynthia, when by his own future actions he was, himself, more than likely to destroy the boy's every hope of wedding her.

The irony of his attitude smote him hard, and he rose abruptly.