mportant in the world than human happiness; and
as the simple 'Yes' or 'No' of maidenhood may decide the happiness of
not one but two lives, that is why it is a matter of universal interest
in song and story; and that is why quite elderly people, removed by
half a century from such frivolities themselves, but nevertheless
possessed of memory and a little imagination, and still conscious that
life has been throughout a puzzle and a game of chance, and that even
in their case it might have turned out very differently, find
themselves awaiting with a strange curiosity and anxiety the decision
of some child of seventeen, knowing no more of the world than a baby
dormouse.

On the other hand, the woman who does not marry is still less likely to
forget such an offer. Here, plainly enough, was a turning-point in her
life; what has happened since she owes to her decision then. And as an
unmarried life is naturally and necessarily an unfulfilled life, where
no great duty or purpose steps in to stop the gap, it is but little
wonder if in moments of disquietude or unrest the mind should travel
away in strange speculations, and if the memory of a particular person
should be kept very green indeed. Nan Beresford, at the age of twenty,
would have been greatly shocked if you had told her that during the
past three years she had been almost continually thinking about the
young sailor whom she had rejected at Bellagio. Had she not been most
explicit--even eagerly explicit? Had she not experienced an
extraordinary sense of relief when he was well away from the place, and
when she could prove to herself in close self-examination that she was
in no way to blame for what had occurred? She was a little sorry for
him, it is true; but she could not believe that it was a very serious
matter. He would soon forget that idle dream in the brisk realities of
his profession, and he would show that he was not like those other
young men who came fluttering round her sisters with their simmering
sentimentalities and vain flirtations. Above all, she had been
explicit. That episode was over and closed. It was attached to
Bellagio; leaving Bellagio, they would leave it also behind. And she
was glad to get away from Bellagio.

Yes; Nan would have been greatly shocked if you had told her that
during these three years she had been frequently thinking of Frank
King--except, of course, in the way any one may think of an officer in
Her Majesty's Navy