What, she asked herself again, would be the end of it all?
Ten years hence, would she have subdued her soul to a life of weary insignificance, if not of dishonour?
For it was dishonour to live with a man she could not love, whether her heart cherished another image or was merely vacant.

A dishonour to which innumerable women submitted, a dishonour glorified by social precept, enforced under dread penalties.
But she was so young, and life abounds in unexpected changes..