ol
of myself about a woman as easily as about anything else. But I can't
imagine myself playing the fool for anything whatsoever."

There was mysterious fire in Ursula's absent eyes. "You remember me as a
girl--how mercenary I was--how near I came to marrying Cousin Jake?"

"I saved you from that."

"Yes--and for what? I fell in love."

"And out again."

"I was deceived in Clayton--deceived myself--naturally. How is a woman
to know, without experience?"

"Oh, I'm not criticising," said the brother.

"Besides, a love marriage that fails is different from a mercenary
marriage that fails."

"Very--very," agreed he. "Just the difference between an honorable and a
dishonorable bankruptcy."

"Anyhow--it's bankrupt--my marriage. But I've learned what love is--that
there is such a thing--and that it's valuable. Yes, Fred, I've got the
taste for that wine--the habit of it. Could I go back to water or milk?"

"Spoiled baby--that's the whole story. If you had a nursery full of
children--or did the heavy housework--you'd never think of these
foolish moonshiny things."

"Yet you say you love!"

"Clayton is as good as any you're likely to run across--is better than
_some_ I've seen about."

"How can _you_ say?" cried she. "It's for me to judge."

"If you would only _judge_!"

Ursula sighed. "It's useless to talk to you. Let's go down."

Norman, following her from the room, stopped her in the doorway to give
her a brotherly hug and kiss. "You won't make an out-and-out idiot of
yourself, will you, Ursula?" he said, in his winning manner.

The expression of her eyes as she looked at him showed how strong was
his influence over her. "You know I'll come to you for advice before I
do anything final," said she. "Oh, I don't know what I want! I only know
what I don't want. I wish I were well balanced--as you are, Fred."

[Illustration: "'You won't make an out-and-out idiot of yourself, will
you Ursula?'"]

III

The brother and sister dined alone. Clayton was, finding his club a more
comfortable place than his home, in those days of his wife's
disillusionment and hesitation about the future. Many weak creatures are
curiously armed for the unequal conflict of existence--some with
fleetness of foot, some with a pole-cat weapon of malignance, some with
porcupine quills, some with a 'possumlike instinct for "playing dead."
Of these last was Fitzhugh. He knew when to be silent, when to keep out
of the way, when t