ed from my comments you
would see that they were not so very many, including everything she had
so unexpectedly told me of her story. No, not so very many. And now it
seemed as though there would be no more. No! I could expect no more.
The confidence was wonderful enough in its nature as far as it went, and
perhaps not to have been expected from any other girl under the sun.
And I felt a little ashamed. The origin of our intimacy was too
gruesome. It was as if listening to her I had taken advantage of having
seen her poor bewildered, scared soul without its veils. But I was
curious, too; or, to render myself justice without false modesty--I was
anxious; anxious to know a little more.

I felt like a blackmailer all the same when I made my attempt with a
light-hearted remark.

"And so you gave up that walk you proposed to take?"

"Yes, I gave up the walk," she said slowly before raising her downcast
eyes. When she did so it was with an extraordinary effect. It was like
catching sight of a piece of blue sky, of a stretch of open water. And
for a moment I understood the desire of that man to whom the sea and sky
of his solitary life had appeared suddenly incomplete without that
glance which seemed to belong to them both. He was not for nothing the
son of a poet. I looked into those unabashed eyes while the girl went
on, her demure appearance and precise tone changed to a very earnest
expression. Woman is various indeed.

"But I want you to understand, Mr.." she had actually to think of my
name... "Mr Marlow, that I have written to Mrs Fyne that I haven't
been--that I have done nothing to make Captain Anthony behave to me as
he had behaved. I haven't. I haven't. It isn't my doing. It isn't my
fault--if she likes to put it in that way. But she, with her ideas,
ought to understand that I couldn't, that I couldn't--I know she hates
me now. I think she never liked me. I think nobody ever cared for me.
I was told once nobody could care for me; and I think it is true. At
any rate I can't forget it."

Her abominable experience with the governess had implanted in her
unlucky breast a lasting doubt, an ineradicable suspicion of herself and
of others I said:

"Remember, Miss de Barral, that to be fair you must trust a man
altogether--or not at all."

She dropped her eyes suddenly. I thought I heard a faint sigh. I tried
to take a light tone again, and yet it seemed impossible to get off the
ground whic