er. Her very accusations, her readiness to find fault, which might have
made matters clear to some men, only disheartened him with a renewed
sense of her dislike.

'You hate my nation,' he said, after a pause of consideration,
'therefore you condemn me, not because of anything I have done, but on
general grounds, putting the worst construction on--on everything. I
wonder why you judge me so hardly?'

Valerie laughed, her red lip finely edged with scorn.

'On the contrary, you judge us! Who made you a judge over us? You regard
us--you English--with that straight steady look. I suppose you feel what
futile creatures we others are, with our shifting moods and passions,
our little furies and desperations! Do you remember the night you joined
the Guard--the night in the Cloister of St. Anthony? How I trembled and
feared for you, I'--she laughed again--'I even wanted to help you! How
absurd it all seemed to you, didn't it? I remember you were very cool
and quiet, and I suppose you thought it very foolish--one of those
unnecessary, extravagant emotions in which we inferior races are apt to
indulge!'

'Stop!' Rallywood cut her short with a peremptory word, 'I will not
allow you to say such things of yourself nor--of me!'

Valerie threw back her head with the slight haughty lift he knew so
well.

'You are rather too certain of your own power,' she said.

'You say you remember that night?--not so well as I do? You think I am
very sure of myself. And yet I have been mistaken on points that touch
me close. I thought that night when I knew I might never see the
morning--I dared to fancy that we--you and I--understood each other--a
little.' He waited, but Valerie had turned away; her profile looked
exquisite, but cold, against the dark shutter as she watched the driving
snow. 'So I was the fool after all, you see!' he ended lamely.

According to the immemorial fashion of love, they understood and
misunderstood each other alternately playing high and low at every other
moment upon the wide gamut of feeling, touching faint sweet notes that
would echo for ever.

Rallywood's self-control was giving way a little, and she instinctively
felt her power and used it.

'I wonder what you really think of us behind that quiet alertness of
yours,' she said lightly, 'I believe I did imagine I--understood you a
little that night; but I imagine it no longer! Perhaps I misjudge you
now, but it cannot matter; you told me once you knew how t