least as strong. If we are equal in that,
what else matters? I am not going to cry Peccavi about the past. I have lived,
and you know what that means in my language. In what am I inferior as a man to
Cecily as a woman? Would you have me snivel, and talk about my impurity and her
angelic qualities? You know that you would despise me if I did - or any other
man who used the same empty old phrases.«
    »I grant you that,« replied Mallard, deliberately. »I believe I am no more
superstitious with regard to these questions than you are, and I want to hear no
cant. Let us take it on more open ground. Were Cecily Doran my daughter, I would
resist her marrying you to the utmost of my power - not simply because you have
lived laxly, but because of my conviction that the part of your life is to be a
pattern of the whole. I have no faith in you - no faith in your sense of honour,
in your stability, not even in your mercy. Your wife will be, sooner or later,
one of the unhappiest of women. Thinking of you in this way, and being in the
place of a parent to Cecily, am I doing my duty or not in insisting that she
shall not marry you hastily, that even in her own despite she shall have time to
study you and herself, that she shall only take the irrevocable step when she
clearly knows that it is done on her own responsibility? You may urge what you
like; I am not so foolish as to suppose you capable of consideration for others
in your present state of mind. I, however, shall defend myself from the girl's
reproaches in after-years. There will be no marriage until she is twenty-one.«
    A silence of some duration followed. Elgar sat with bent head, twisting his
moustaches. At length:
    »I believe you are right, Mallard. Not in your judgment of me, but in your
practical resolve.«
    Mallard examined him from under his eyebrows.
    »You are prepared to wait?« he asked, in an uncertain voice.
    »Prepared, no. But I grant the force of your arguments. I will try to bring
myself to patience.«
    Mallard sat unmoving. His legs were crossed, and he held his soft felt hat
crushed together in both his hands. Elgar glanced at him once or twice,
expecting him to speak, but the other was mute.
    »Your judgment of me,« Elgar