Page:The Confessions of a Well-Meaning Woman.djvu/246

 two people drawn from different worlds. . . And this terrible, blasting knowledge that he—and she—and I had of the girl’s character. Ruin, misery lay before them. And nothing else. . . I had to save Will from any temptation to yield. If he could have fallen in love with some nice girl and forgotten the whole episode. . . If I could have sent him right away. . . It was not easy, and you know better than any one that my hands have been fairly full. At one time I thought that South American woman was attracted by him, at another my niece Phyllida roused to interest. He was so much preoccupied that he seemed indifferent to women; one after another, they gave him up in despair. Then I bethought me of my second string and cast about in my mind for means to send him far away where he could forget this girl and her importunity. . . You have met Sir Appleton Deepe in this house. You have met him more than once and you have always been too dear and too discreet to ask, to hint, to raise an eyebrow in mild wonder that I should be liée with such a man. Of his kind I believe he has no rival. As a mere boy he was sent out to one of the Chinese branches of the business; and by sheer hard work, by studying the natives and learning