eitfully.' But smaller natures are more
complex. They defy analysis, because their motives are not consistent."

"Most people think to be complex is to be great," I objected.

She shook her head. "That is quite a mistake," she answered. "Great
natures are simple, and relatively predictable, since their motives
balance one another justly. Small natures are complex, and hard to
predict, because small passions, small jealousies, small discords
and perturbations come in at all moments, and override for a time the
permanent underlying factors of character. Great natures, good or bad,
are equably poised; small natures let petty motives intervene to upset
their balance."

"Then you knew I would come," I exclaimed, half pleased to find I
belonged inferentially to her higher category.

Her eyes beamed on me with a beautiful light. "Knew you would come? Oh,
yes. I begged you not to come; but I felt sure you were too deeply in
earnest to obey me. I asked a friend in Cape Town to telegraph your
arrival; and almost ever since the telegram reached me I have been
expecting you and awaiting you."

"So you believed in me?"

"Implicitly--as you in me. That is the worst of it, Hubert. If you did
NOT believe in me, I could have told you all--and then, you would have
left me. But, as it is, you KNOW all--and yet, you want to cling to me."

"You know I know all--because Sebastian told me?"

"Yes; and I think I even know how you answered him."

"How?"

She paused. The calm smile lighted up her face once more. Then she
drew out a pencil. "You think life must lack plot-interest for me," she
began, slowly, "because, with certain natures, I can partially guess
beforehand what is coming. But have you not observed that, in reading
a novel, part of the pleasure you feel arises from your conscious
anticipation of the end, and your satisfaction in seeing that you
anticipated correctly? Or part, sometimes, from the occasional
unexpectedness of the real denouement? Well, life is like that. I enjoy
observing my successes, and, in a way, my failures. Let me show you what
I mean. I think I know what you said to Sebastian--not the words, of
course, but the purport; and I will write it down now for you. Set down
YOUR version, too. And then we will compare them."

It was a crucial test. We both wrote for a minute or two. Somehow, in
Hilda's presence, I forgot at once the strangeness of the scene, the
weird oddity of the moment. That sombre plain