erent? You mean that I am incapable of really doing anything; you
have no faith in me. I seem to you too weak to pursue any high end. You
would not even speak to me of your book, because you felt I should not
appreciate it. And yet you do know me--"

"Yes; I know you well," Waymark said.

Ida looked steadily at him. "If you are speaking to me for the last
time, won't you be sincere, and tell me of my faults? Do you think I
could not bear it? You can say nothing to me--nothing from your
heart--that I won't accept in all humility. Are we no longer even
friends?"

"You mistake me altogether."

"And you are still my friend?" she uttered warmly. "But why do you
think me unfit for good work?"

"I had no such thought. You know how my ideals oppose each other. I
spoke on the impulse of the moment; I often find it so hard to
reconcile myself to anything in life that is not, still and calm and
beautiful. I am just now bent on forgetting all the things about which
you are so earnest."

"Earnest? Yes. But I cannot give my whole self to the work. I am so
lonely."

"You will not be so for long," he answered with more cheerfulness. "You
have every opportunity of making for yourself a good social position.
You will soon have friends, if only you seek them. Your goodness will
make you respected. Indeed I wonder at your remaining so isolated. It
need not be; I am sure it need not. Your wealth--I have no thought of
speaking cynically--your wealth must--"

"My wealth! What is it to me? What do I care for all the friends it
might bring? They are nothing to me in my misery. But you ... I would
give all I possess for one kind word from you."

Flushing over forehead and cheeks, she compelled herself to meet his
look. It was her wealth that stood between her and him. Her position
was not like that of other women. Conventionalities were meaningless,
set against a life.

"I have tried hard to make myself ever so little worthy of you," she
murmured, when her voice would again obey her will. "Am I still--still
too far beneath you?"

He stood like one detected in a crime, and stammered the words.

"Ida, I am not free."

He had risen. Ida sprang up, and moved towards him.

"_This_ was your secret? Tell me, then. Look--_I_ am strong! Tell me
about it. I might have thought of this. I thought only of myself. I
might have known there was good reason for the distance you put between
us. Forgive me--oh, forgive the pain I have caused you