hether he ought to kiss her or not, but Mrs. Pasmer
did not in the abstract seem like a very kissing kind of person, and he
let himself be guided by this impression, in the absence of any fixed
principle applying to the case. She made some neat remark concerning the
probable settlement of the affair with her husband, and began to laugh
and joke about it in a manner that was very welcome to Dan; it did not
seem to him that it ought to be treated so solemnly.

But though Mrs. Pasmer laughed and joked; he was aware of her meaning
business--business in the nicest sort of a way, but business after all,
and he liked her for it. He was glad to be explicit about his hopes and
plans, and told what his circumstances were so fully that Mrs. Pasmer,
whom his frankness gratified and amused, felt obliged to say that she
had not meant to ask so much about his affairs, and he must excuse her
if she had seemed to do so. She had her own belief that Mavering would
understand, but she did not mind that. She said that, of course,
till his own family had been consulted, it must not be considered
seriously--that Mr. Pasmer insisted upon that point; and when Dan
vehemently asserted the acquiescence of his family beforehand, and urged
his father's admiration for Alice in proof, she reminded him that his
mother was to be considered, and put Mr. Pasmer's scruples forward as
her own reason for obduracy. In her husband's presence she attributed
to him, with his silent assent, all sorts of reluctances and delicate
compunctions; she gave him the importance which would have been
naturally a husband's due in such an affair, and ingratiated herself
more and more with the young man. She ignored Mr. Pasmer's withdrawal
when it took place, after a certain lapse of time, and as the moment had
come for that, she began to let herself go. She especially approved
of the idea of going abroad and confessed her disappointment with her
present experiment of America, where it appeared there was no leisure
class of men sufficiently large to satisfy the social needs of Mr.
Pasmer's nature, and she told Dan that he might expect them in Europe
before long. Perhaps they might all three meet him there. At this he
betrayed so clearly that he now intended his going to Europe merely as a
sequel to his marrying Alice, while he affected to fall in with all Mrs.
Pasmer said, that she grew fonder than ever of him for his ardour and
his futile duplicity. If it had been in Dan's mi