Now he was a young man, speaking almost as if he were a little boy--involuntarily revealing his exaltation.
As she had felt half frightened years before, so she felt wholly frightened now.

He was not a little boy any longer.

She could not sweep him away in her arms to save him from danger.

Also she knew more of the easy, fashionably accepted views of the morals of pretty Mrs.
Gareth-Lawless, still lightly known with some cynicism as "Feather." She knew what Donal did not.

His relationship to the Head of the House of Coombe made it unlikely that gossip should choose him as the exact young man to whom could be related stories of his distinguished relative, Mrs.
Gareth-Lawless and her girl.