It gave you a very safe, restful kind of feeling. She was twenty-two now, but she had never had cause to change that seven-year-old opinion. People wanted things and they pushed until they got them. They said it was for your own good, or that you owed it to them, or that they were in love with you, but it all came the same in the end-they pushed, and you had to give way. Only Adrian didn’t push. He listened, and he was kind.

He was being kind now. He said,

‘Never mind, my dear.’

The blue eyes were lifted. They had a wincing look.

‘It’s Aunt Sybil-why does she want to make me?’

He said very gently indeed,

‘What is she making you do?’

‘Why does she want me to marry Herbert?’

‘Don’t you want to?’

Her eyes were bright with tears. She shook her head.

‘I don’t want to marry anyone. I’m frightened.’

He sat down beside her on the parapet.

‘Look here, my dear, don’t you think you’ve just got the wind up? You know my sister Marian-the one with the jolly husband and four boys. Well, two days before her wedding she came to me and said she couldn’t go through with it, and I must tell Jack. She said she knew she was a wretch and her name would be mud, but she couldn’t marry him, and that was that. So at last I went and told him. He burst out laughing and said, “We’ll soon see about that!” Well, as soon as she saw him she flung her arms round his neck and began to cry, and said she thought she wasn’t ever going to see him again. I went away and left them to it. Afterwards, when I asked her what she meant by making a fool of herself and me, she just laughed and said it was stage fright and I oughtn’t to have taken any notice. Now don’t you think-’

‘No’-she shook her head mournfully-‘I’m not like that.’

‘Are you sure?’ She nodded.

‘You don’t understand.’

‘Suppose you try and tell me-that is, if you want to.’