Alma made no reply.  He scrutinised her as before, and his features worked as if with some emotion.  Then, abruptly, he put a blunt question.

’Do you think people who go in for music, art, and that kind of thing, ought to marry?’

‘I never thought about it at all,’ Alma replied, with a careless laugh, striking a finger across the strings of the violin which she held on her lap.

‘We’re generally told they shouldn’t,’ pursued Dymes, in a voice which had lost its noisy confidence, and was a little uncertain.  ’But it all depends, you know.  If people mean by marriage the ordinary kind of thing —­ of course, that’s the deuce.  But it needn’t be.  Lots of people marry nowadays and live in a rational way —­ no house, or bother of that kind; just going about as they like, and having a pleasant, reasonable life.  It’s easy enough with a little money.  Sometimes they’re a good deal of help to each other; I know people who manage to be.’

‘Oh, I dare say,’ said Alma when he paused.  ’It all depends, as you say.  You’re going on to Italy at once?’

Her half-veiled eyes seemed to conceal amusement, and there was good-humoured disdain in the setting of her lips.  With audacity so incredible that it all but made her laugh, Dymes, not heeding her inquiry, jerked out the personal application of his abstract remarks.  Yes, it was a proposal of marriage —­ marriage on the new plan, without cares or encumbrance; a suggestion rather than a petition; off-hand, unsentimental, yet perfectly serious, as look and tone proclaimed.

‘There’s much to be said for your views,’ Alma replied, with humorous gravity, ‘but I haven’t the least intention of marrying.’

‘Well, I’ve mentioned it.’  He waved his hand as if to overcome an unwonted embarrassment.  ‘You don’t mind?’

‘Not a bit.’

’I hope we shall meet again before long, and —­ some day, you know —­ you may see the thing in another light.  You mustn’t think I’m joking.’

‘But it is rather a joke.’

’No; I never was more in earnest about anything, believe me.  And I’m convinced it’s a good idea.  However, you know one thing —­ if I can be of use to you, I shall.  I’ll think it over —­ your chances and so on; something may suggest itself.  You’re not cut out for everyday things.’

‘I try to hope not.’

‘Ah, but you can take my word for it.’

With this comforting assurance, Felix Dymes departed.  No melodrama; a hand-grip, a significant nod, a loud humming as he went downstairs.

Alma presently began a new letter to Sibyl Carnaby.  It was written in a cheery humour, though touched by the shadow of distressful circumstance.  She told the story of Mr. Dymes’s visit, and made merry over it.  ’I am sure this is the very newest thing in “proposals”.  Though I live in such a dull, lonely way, it has made me feel that I am still in touch with civilisation.