“I can’t make you out, Mother,” he said. “Either that fellow wants to get social prestige by persuading you to marry him, or you are just exploiting him⁠ ⁠… playing on his infatuation and using him. Whichever way it is, I don’t like it.”

Instead of replying to him directly, Mrs. Solent glanced at the great manuscript-packet, which he had put down carelessly between her coffeepot and her loaf of brown bread.

“What’s that you’ve got there, Wolf?” she asked; and, though apparently innocent, her question carried for him a mischievous implication.

“His book, Mother⁠ ⁠… Urquhart’s book. I finished it last night.”

Her eyes glittered like those of a triumphant witch, and her bright cheeks glowed like a couple of russet apples.