And I can think of no other valid reason, excepting that she doesn't care enough for me.

That would be a perfectly sound reason, but then it would only be a temporary one, not the insuperable obstacle that she assumes to exist, especially as we really got on excellently together.

I hope it isn't some confounded perverse feminine scruple.

I don't see how it could be; but women are most frightfully tortuous and wrong-headed at times." "I don't see," said Thorndyke, "why we should cast about for perversely abnormal motives when there is a perfectly reasonable explanation staring us in the face." "Is there ?" I exclaimed.

"I see none." "You are, not unnaturally, overlooking some of the circumstances that affect Miss Bellingham; but I don't suppose she has failed to grasp their meaning.