"Well," said Miss Pratt, weightily, "sometimes one way, sometimes the
other."

William's gravity became more and more profound. "Yes, but how can they
pretend like that? Don't you think love is a sacred thing, Cousin Lola?"

Fictitious sisterships, brotherships, and cousinships are devices to
push things along, well known to seventeen and even more advanced ages.
On the wonderful evening of their first meeting William and Miss Pratt
had cozily arranged to be called, respectively, "Ickle boy Baxter" and
"Cousin Lola." (Thus they had broken down the tedious formalities of
their first twenty minutes together.)

"Don't you think love is sacred?" he repeated in the deepest tone of
which his vocal cords were capable.

"Ess," said Miss Pratt.

"_I_ do!" William was emphatic. "I think love is the most sacred thing
there is. I don't mean SOME kinds of love. I mean REAL love. You take
some people, I don't believe they ever know what real love means. They
TALK about it, maybe, but they don't understand it. Love is something
nobody can understand unless they feel it and and if they don't
understand it they don't feel it. Don't YOU think so?"

"Ess."

"Love," William continued, his voice lifting and thrilling to the great
theme--"love is something nobody can ever have but one time in their