His taste and philosophy she absorbed in a few moments on their evening walk, during which Stane talked to her freely of himself.
Like Cowperwood, he was inclined to accept and even rejoice in his lot as he found it.
He was wealthy.
He was, after a fashion, gifted.
He was titled.
“But I have done nothing to earn or deserve anything that I have,” he admitted at one point.
“I can believe that,” said Berenice, laughing.
“But here I am,” he went on, pretending to ignore her interruption.
“The world is like that, unfair, full of gifts for some and nothing for others.”
“I do agree with you there,” said Berenice, suddenly serious.
“Life seems to be shot through with crazy predestinations, some beautiful and some terrible or shameful or brutal.”
Stane had then gone on to discuss his life.
His father, he said, had wanted him to marry the daughter of a friend of his, also an earl.
But, as Stane expressed it, there was not enough attraction between them.
And later, at Cambridge, he had decided to delay marriage on any terms until he had seen more of the world.
“But the trouble is,” he said, “I seem to have fallen into the habit of travel.
And, in between, there’s London, Paris, Tregasal, and Pryor’s Cove, when it is unoccupied.”
“But what troubles me,” said Berenice, “is what a lone bachelor can do with all those places.”
“They cater to my principal diversion, which is partying,” he answered.
“There’s a great deal of that here, as you must have seen for yourself.
You can hardly escape it.
But also I work, you know, sometimes very strenuously.”
“For the pleasure of it?”
“Yes, I think so.
At least, it keeps me in countenance with myself, establishes a balance that I find to be healthy.”
And he went on to develop his pet theory that the significance of a title unaccompanied by personal achievement was little.
Besides, the world’s interest was turning to men who worked in the realm of science and economics, and it was economics which most interested him.
“But that’s not what I want to talk about,” he concluded, “but rather of Tregasal.
It’s a little too distant and too bare for ordinary partying, thank goodness, so when I want a real crowd I have to do a little planning.
Contrasted with all that goes around London, it’s very different, and I frequently use it as an escape.”
Immediately Berenice sensed that he was pressing for a better understanding between them.
It might be best, she thought, to end the matter at once, to make sure here and now that there would be no further development.
Yet she resented the necessity for such action in the case of someone whose view of life seemed as broad as her own.
She even speculated, looking at Stane as they walked, as to whether, in case she told him of her true relation to Cowperwood, he might not be inclined to let his natural interest dominate and sustain his social courtesies.
For, after all, he was now associated with Cowperwood financially and might respect him sufficiently to respect her also.
At the same time, there was this very real attraction toward him.
She decided to postpone the conversation for that evening.
But the following morning, and shortly after sunrise, it began again when they met for an early breakfast and horseback ride.
For he insisted that he was running off to Tregasal not only to get a few days’ rest but also to be able to think clearly concerning some important financial matters which were requiring his attention.
“You see, I have let myself in for a lot of work in connection with your guardian’s underground plans,” he confided.
“Perhaps you may know that he has a very complicated program, for which he seems to think he needs my help.
And I am trying to decide whether I can be of any real use to him.”
He paused as if waiting to see whether she had anything to say.
But Berenice, jogging close beside him, was strongly determined not to express herself in any way.
And so now she said. “Mr. Cowperwood happens to be my guardian, but his financial goings-on are a mystery to me.
I am more interested in the lovely things money can accomplish than I am in how it is made.”
She gave him a wavering smile.
Stane checked his horse for a moment, and turning to look at her, exclaimed: “My word, you think precisely as I do!
I often wonder, loving beauty as I do, why I bother with practical matters in any form.
I am often at war with myself over this point.”