While on the way home, I had utilized the time by making to Utis my customary report of the day's proceedings. He said little till we had reached my apartment.
"From what you say," he began, "it is plain that you are deeply in love with Reva Diotha."
I nodded assent, awaiting in some anxiety what my host had further to say; as it was manifest that he was in difficulty as to how to proceed.
"If you succeed in winning Reva," he resumed, "I shall have good reason to congratulate you. I have looked forward to the possibility of this since the moment you met by the merest accident. It was plain to me, that you were, in some way, strongly attracted by her; and she, again, was at least interested in her cousin from so far. Events, however, have moved much more rapidly than I expected; and now I find a duty thrust upon me that I hoped to escape."
"How so?" I inquired.
"In the ordinary course of things, you could not have had so many opportunities of seeing Reva that it would
