Gaston Probert made his plan, confiding¹ it only to his friend Waterlow whose help indeed he needed to carry it out. These revelations cost him something, for the ornament² of the merciless school, as it might have been called, found his predicament amusing and made no scruple³ of showing it. Gaston was too much in love, however, to be upset by a bad joke or two. This fact is the more noteworthy as he knew that Waterlow scoffed⁴ at him for a purpose — had a view of the good to be done him by throwing him on the defensive⁵. The French tradition, or a grimacing⁶ ghost of it, was in Waterlow’s “manner,” but it had not made its mark on his view of the relations of a young man of spirit with parents and pastors⁷. He mixed his colours, as might have been said, with the general sense of France, but his early American immunities⁸ and serenities could still swell⁹ his sail in any “vital” discussion with a friend in whose life the principle of authority played so large a part. He accused Probert of being afraid of his sisters, which was an effective way — and he knew it — of alluding¹⁰ to the rigidity¹¹ of the conception of the family among people who had adopted and had even to Waterlow’s sense, as the phrase is, improved upon the “Latin” ideal. That did injustice

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