er, oh, damnably harder, than he had expected! Arguments,
expedients, palliations, evasions, all seemed to be slipping away
from him: he was left face to face with the mere graceless fact of his
inferiority. He lifted his head to ask at random: "You've been here,
then, ever since?"

"Since June; yes. It turned out that the Farlows were hunting for
me--all the while--for this."

She stood facing him, her back to the window, evidently impatient to be
gone, yet with something still to say, or that she expected to hear him
say. The sense of her expectancy benumbed him. What in heaven's name
could he say to her that was not an offense or a mockery?

"Your idea of the theatre--you gave that up at once, then?"

"Oh, the theatre!" She gave a little laugh. "I couldn't wait for the
theatre. I had to take the first thing that offered; I took this."

He pushed on haltingly: "I'm glad--extremely glad--you're happy
here...I'd counted on your letting me know if there was anything I could
do...The theatre, now--if you still regret it--if you're not contented
here...I know people in that line in London--I'm certain I can manage it
for you when I get back----"

She moved up to the table and leaned over it to ask, in a voice that was
hardly above a whisper: "Then you DO want me to leave? Is that it?"

He dropped his arms with a groan. "Good heavens! How can you think such
things? At the time, you know, I begged you to let me do what I could,
but you wouldn't hear of it...and ever since I've been wanting to be of
use--to do something, anything, to help you..."

She heard him through, motionless, without a quiver of the clasped hands
she rested on the edge of the table.

"If you want to help me, then--you can help me to stay here," she
brought out with low-toned intensity.

Through the stillness of the pause which followed, the bray of a
motor-horn sounded far down the drive. Instantly she turned, with a last
white look at him, and fled from the room and up the stairs. He stood
motionless, benumbed by the shock of her last words. She was afraid,
then--afraid of him--sick with fear of him! The discovery beat him down
to a lower depth...

The motor-horn sounded again, close at hand, and he turned and went
up to his room. His letter-writing was a sufficient pretext for not
immediately joining the party about the tea-table, and he wanted to be
alone and try to put a little order into his tumultuous thinking.

Upstairs, the room he