hey found
their hostess gay and entertaining.

Miss Wynn gathered books about her, and in the days of April and May she
and Alwyn read up on education. He marvelled at the subtlety of her
mind, and she at the relentlessness of his. They were very near each
other during these days, and yet there was ever something between them:
a vision to him of dark and pleading eyes that he constantly saw beside
her cool, keen glance. And he to her was always two men: one man above
men, whom she could respect but would not marry, and one man like all
men, whom she would marry but could not respect. His devotion to an
ideal which she thought so utterly unpractical, aroused keen curiosity
and admiration. She was sure he would fail in the end, and she wanted
him to fail; and somehow, somewhere back beyond herself, her better self
longed to find herself defeated; to see this mind stand firm on
principle, under circumstances where she believed men never stood. Deep
within her she discovered at times a passionate longing to believe in
somebody; yet she found herself bending every energy to pull this man
down to the level of time-servers, and even as she failed, feeling
something like contempt for his stubbornness.

The great day came. He had her notes, her suggestions, her hints, but
she had no intimation of what he would finally say.

"Will you come to hear me?" he asked.

"No," she murmured.

"That is best," he said, and then he added slowly, "I would not like you
ever to despise me."

She answered sharply: "I want to despise you!"

Did he understand? She was not sure. She was sorry she had said it; but
she meant it fiercely. Then he left her, for it was already four in the
afternoon and he spoke at eight.

In the morning she came down early, despite some dawdling over her
toilet. She brought the morning paper into the dining-room and sat down
with it, sipping her coffee. She leaned back and looked leisurely at the
headings. There was nothing on the front page but a divorce, a
revolution, and a new Trust. She took another sip of her coffee, and
turned the page. There it was, "Colored High Schools Close--Vicious
Attack on Republican Party by Negro Orator."

She laid the paper aside and slowly finished her coffee. A few minutes
later she went to her desk and sat there so long that she started at
hearing the clock strike nine.

The day passed. When she came home from school she bought an evening
paper. She was not surprised to l