Inwardly I laughed at the egotism of raw nerves that had conjured it up, even for an instant, as a reason for gratitude.

The situation was not so peculiar, not so interesting, as that.

But I answered his stare with a smile; what I had said might very well stand.
'Do you imagine,' he said, seeing that I did not mean to amplify it, 'that I want to marry her out of any sort of GOODness ?' 'Benevolence is your weakness, Dacres.' 'I see.

You think one's motive is to withdraw her from a relation which ought to be the most natural in the world, but which is, in her particular and painful case, the most equivocal.' 'Well, come,' I remonstrated.

'You have dropped one or two things, you know, in the heat of your indignation, not badly calculated to give one that idea.