‘I’m glad it’s over,’ he replied cordially.  ’Now begins a new life for you.’

‘But eight years —­ eight years of waiting ——­’

’Hang it, what is your age?  Thirty!  Why, you’re only just old enough.  No man ought to marry before thirty.’

Morphew interrupted vehemently.

’That’s all rot!  Excuse me; I can’t help it.  A man ought to marry when he’s urged to it by his nature, and as soon as he finds the right woman.  If I had married eight years ago ——.’  He broke off with an angry gesture, misery in his eyes.  ’You don’t believe that humbug, Rolfe; you repeat it just to console me.  There’s little consolation, I can assure you.  I was two and twenty; she, nineteen.  Mature man and woman; and we longed for each other.  Nothing but harm could come of waiting year after year, wretched both of us.’

‘I confess,’ said Harvey, ’I don’t quite see why she waited after twenty-one.’

’Because she is a good, gentle girl, and could not bear to make her father and mother unhappy.  The blame is all theirs —­ mean, shallow, grovelling souls!’

‘What about her mother now?’

’Oh, she was never so obstinate as the old jackass.  She’ll have little enough to live upon, and we shall soon arrange things with her somehow.  Is it credible that human beings can be so senseless?  For years now, their means have been growing less and less, just because the snobbish idiot would keep up appearances.  If he had lived a little longer, the widow would have had practically no income at all.  Of course, she shared in the folly, and I’m only sorry she won’t suffer more for it.  They didn’t enjoy their lives —­ never have done.  They lived in miserable slavery to the opinion of their fellow-snobs.  You remember that story about the flowers at their silver wedding:  two hundred pounds —­ just because Mrs. Somebody spent as much —­ when they couldn’t really afford two hundred shillings.  And they groaned over it —­ he and she —­ like people with the stomachache.  Why, the old fool died of nothing else; he was worn out by the fear of having to go into a smaller house.’

Harvey would have liked to put a question:  was it possible that the daughter of such people could be endowed with virtues such as become the wife of a comparatively poor man?  But he had to ask it merely in his own thoughts.  Before long, no doubt, he would meet the lady herself and appease his curiosity.

Whilst they were talking, there came a knock at the door; the shopman announced two ladies, who wished to inquire about some photographic printing.

‘Will you see them, Rolfe?’ asked Cecil.  ’I don’t feel like it —­ indeed I don’t.  You’ll be able to tell them all they want.’

Harvey found himself equal to the occasion, and was glad of it; he needed occupation of some kind to keep his thoughts from an unpleasant subject.  After another talk with Morphew, in which they stuck to business, he set off homeward.