MAGIC The next day after luncheon, as Stephen walked from his club to his office, he lived over again his evening with Margaret.

"If she cared for me it might be different," he mused; and then, through some perversity of memory, Margaret's pensive smile became suddenly charged with emotion, and he asked himself if he had not misinterpreted her innocent frankness?
Even if she cared, he knew that she would die rather than betray her preference by a word or a look.

"Whether she cares or not, and it is just possible that she does care in her heart, she will marry me if I ask her," he thought; and decided immediately that there was no necessity to act impulsively in the matter.

"If I ask her she will persuade herself that she loves me.

She will marry me just as hundreds of women have married men in the past; and we should probably live as long and as happily as all the others." That was the way his father and mother had married; and why were he and Margaret different from the generations before them?
What variable strain in their natures impelled them to lead their own separate lives instead of the collective life of the family?
"I suppose Mother is right as far as she sees," he admitted.
"To marry Margaret and settle down would be the best thing that could happen to me." Yet he had no sooner put the thought into words than the old feeling of suffocation rushed over him as if his hopes were smothered in ashes.
Yes, he would settle down, of course, but not now.