"Only one thing she can take seriously? A person, you mean?"
"Yes," Claire said; and now, as she spoke, she turned her head and looked at him with a clear and friendly regard. "I hear you've been everywhere with her lately and by this time you probably feel that you know her pretty well. Don't you?"
"Why, yes; of course."
Claire shook her head. "You don't. Nobody does. She doesn't, herself. She last of all, indeed!"
"You think so?"
"I know so," Claire said quietly. "She's eighteen. I know what I was like at eighteen and it's what I've been more or less like ever since, until I found twenty-five coming down on me. Of course I was a little less like eighteen with every advancing year, yet sometimes I feel that I've only lately quite got over being Miss Kitty Peale. Well, you see, I know her, and she's not good enough for you, Walter."
"Why, what"
"Wait a moment. A girl of eighteen can't take you seriously; she can't take anything seriously, except herself; she can't think of anything except herself. It isn't her fault; she doesn't know how. She can't
