"I tell you he is a
good man! He is a man nobody understands--"
Montague shrugged his shoulders. "It is possible," he said. "I have
heard that before. Many men are better than the things they do in
this world; at any rate, they like to persuade themselves that they
are. But you have no right to wreck your life out of pity for Ryder.
He has made his own reputation, and if he had any real care for you,
he would not ask you to sacrifice yourself to it."
"He did not ask me to," said Lucy. "What I have done, I have done of
my own free will. I believe in him, and I will not believe the
horrible things that you tell me."
"Very well," said Montague, "then you will have to go your own way."
He spoke calmly, though really his heart was wrung with grief. He
knew exactly the sort of conversation by which Stanley Ryder had
brought Lucy to this state of mind. He could have shattered the
beautiful image of himself which Ryder had conjured up; but he could
not bear to do it. Perhaps it was an instinct which guided him--he
knew that Lucy was in love with the man, and that no facts that
anyone could bring would make any difference to her.
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