. It is nice of you to come.
You'll have some tea, won't you?"

The maid had brought in the tray. Afternoon tea was still rather a new
custom with us, more of a ceremony than a meal; and as Nancy handed
me my cup and the thinnest of slices of bread and butter I found the
intimacy of the situation a little disquieting. Her manner was indeed
intimate, and yet it had the odd and disturbing effect of making her
seem more remote. As she chatted I answered her perfunctorily, while all
the time I was asking myself why I had ceased to desire her, whether
the old longing for her might not return--was not even now returning? I
might indeed go far afield to find a wife so suited to me as Nancy. She
had beauty, distinction, and position. She was a woman of whom any man
might be proud....

"I haven't congratulated you yet, Hugh," she said suddenly, "now that
you are a partner of Mr. Watling's. I hear on all sides that you are on
the high road to a great success."

"Of course I'm glad to be in the firm," I admitted.

It was a new tack for Nancy, rather a disquieting one, this discussion
of my affairs, which she had so long avoided or ignored. "You are
getting what you have always wanted, aren't you?"

I wondered in some trepidation whether by that word "always" she was
making a deliberate reference to the past.

"Always?" I repeated, rather fatuously.

"Nearly always, ever since you have been a man."

I was incapable of taking advantage of the opening, if it were one. She
was baffling.

"A man likes to succeed in his profession, of course," I said.

"And you made up your mind to succeed more deliberately than most men. I
needn't ask you if you are satisfied, Hugh. Success seems to agree with
you,--although I imagine you will never be satisfied."

"Why do you say that?" I demanded.

"I haven't known you all your life for nothing. I think I know you much
better than you know yourself."

"You haven't acted as if you did," I exclaimed.

She smiled.

"Have you been interested in what I thought about you?" she asked.

"That isn't quite fair, Nancy," I protested. "You haven't given me much
evidence that you did think about me."

"Have I received much encouragement to do so?" she inquired.

"But you haven't seemed to invite--you've kept me at arm's length."

"Oh, don't fence!" she cried, rather sharply.

I had become agitated, but her next words gave me a shock that was
momentarily paralyzing.

"I asked you to come