ed it."

Mrs. Gereth said nothing for a minute. "You're prodigious in your choice
of terms!" she then simply ejaculated.

But Fleda went luminously on; she once more enjoyed her great command of
her subject: "I think that when you came to see me at Maggie's you saw
too many things, you had too many ideas."

"You had none," said Mrs. Gereth: "you were completely bewildered."

"Yes, I didn't quite understand--but I think I understand now. The case
is simple and logical enough. She's a person who's upset by failure and
who blooms and expands with success. There was something she had set her
heart upon, set her teeth about--the house exactly as she had seen it."

"She never saw it at all, she never looked at it!" cried Mrs. Gereth.

"She doesn't look with her eyes; she looks with her ears. In her own way
she had taken it in; she knew, she felt when it had been touched. That
probably made her take an attitude that was extremely disagreeable. But
the attitude lasted only while the reason for it lasted."

"Go on--I can bear it now," said Mrs. Gereth. Her companion had just
perceptibly paused.

"I know you can, or I shouldn't dream of speaking. When the pressure was
removed she came up again. From the moment the house was once more what
it had to be, her natural charm reasserted itself."

"Her natural charm!" Mrs. Gereth could barely articulate.

"It's very great; everybody thinks so; there must be something in it. It
operated as it had operated before. There's no need of imagining
anything very monstrous. Her restored good humor, her splendid beauty,
and Mr. Owen's impressibility and generosity sufficiently cover the
ground. His great bright sun came out!"

"And his great bright passion for another person went in. Your
explanation would doubtless be perfection if he didn't love you."

Fleda was silent a little. "What do you know about his 'loving' me?"

"I know what Mrs. Brigstock herself told me."

"You never in your life took her word for any other matter."

"Then won't yours do?" Mrs. Gereth demanded. "Haven't I had it from your
own mouth that he cares for you?"

Fleda turned pale, but she faced her companion and smiled. "You
confound, Mrs. Gereth, you mix things up. You've only had it from my own
mouth that I care for _him_!"

It was doubtless in contradictious allusion to this (which at the time
had made her simply drop her head as in a strange, vain reverie) that
Mrs. Gereth, a day or two later, said t