is
far better broken than kept, and, come to think of it, I am not
at all sure that I am anxious to have you keep it. How do you
know that I am not making a desperate effort to secure my own
release?"

She raised her head quite unexpectedly and caught me with the
tears in my eyes. My eyes always were weak. "Why, you are
crying!" she said.

"Of course I'm crying. I always cry when I am particularly well
pleased. It is a family peculiarity. You should see me at the
theatre. At a farce comedy I am a depressing sight, and that is
the reason I always avoid the front seats."

Then realizing that I might be carrying my gayety too far, I went
on more soberly:

"Can't you see, Phyllis, that the old fool's romance must come to
an end? Don't you understand that had I the selfish wish to hold
you to a thoughtless promise, our adventure would terminate only
in misery to us both? Perhaps you and I have been the last to see
it, I, because I was thinking too much of myself, you, because
you were carried away by an exalted sense of duty. Thank heaven
it is clear to us both now. For it is clear, isn't it, dear?"

The foolish girl did not reply, but she kissed my hand, and it is
astonishing how that little act of affection touched and
strengthened me.

"So we are going to make a new start and begin right. To-morrow I
shall see Frederick and make a proposition to him, and if that
rascal does not give up his heroics and come down to his plain
duty as I see it--well, so much the worse for him. No, don't
raise objections"--she had started to speak--"for I am always
quarrelsome when I cannot have my own way. Go to your room and
think it over, and remember," I said more gently, for that old
tide of the past was coming in, "that you are Sylvia's daughter,
and that Sylvia would have trusted me and counselled you to obey
me in all things."

Slowly and with averted face Phyllis rose and walked toward the
door. I had commanded her, and yet I felt a sharp pang of
bitterness that she had yielded so quickly to my words. It seemed
at the moment that everything was passing out of my life; that
Phyllis, that Sylvia, that all the once sweet, continuous memory
was lost to me forever. I could not call her back, and I could
not hope that she would return. Philosopher that I was I could
not explain the sinking and the fear that took possession of me.
The philosopher did not know himself. All his thought and all his
reasoning could not solve the s