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professional life had gone towards warping a nature that was naturally
generous and warm. In imagination Claire lived over the pitiful
romance. Poor Cecil had been badly treated. Some selfish man had made
love to her, amusing his idle hours with the society of a pretty, clever
woman; he had never seriously intended marriage, but Cecil had believed
in his sincerity, had given him her whole heart, had dreamt dreams which
had turned the grey of life to gold.

And then had come the end. How had the end come? Some day when they
were walking together, had he suddenly announced: "I am sailing to India
next month!" or, "We have been such capital friends, you and I. I
should like you to be the first to hear my news. I am engaged to be
married to the dearest girl in the world!" Then, because convention
decrees that when her heart is wounded a woman may make no moan, had
Cecil twisted her lips into a smile, and cried, "I am so glad to hear
it. I hope you will be very happy," while the solid earth rocked around
her? At such thoughts as these Claire flared with righteous anger. "If
that should ever happen to me, I wouldn't pretend! I wouldn't spare
him. I should look him straight in the face, and say, `And all this
time you have been pretending to love me.--I thank God that it _was_
pretence. I thank God that He has preserved me from being the wife of
man who could act a double part!'"

But perhaps there had been no real ending. Perhaps the man had simply
grown tired, and ceased to call, ceased to write. Oh, surely that would
be the greatest tragedy of all! Claire's quick brain summoned pictures
of Cecil creeping down the oil-clothed stairs in her dressing-gown at
the sound of the postman's earliest knock, and creeping back with no
letter in her hand; of Cecil entering the little parlour on her return
from work with a swift hungry look at the table on which the day's
letters were displayed; seeing no letter lying there; never, never the
letter for which she watched! And the days would pass, and the weeks,
and the months, and the old routine of life would go on just the same.
Whatever might be her private sufferings, the English mistress must be
at her post each morning at nine o'clock; she must wrestle all day with
the minds of dull girls, listless girls, clever girls, girls who were
eager to learn, and girls whose energies seemed condensed in the effort
to avoid learning at all. However sore might be the Engli