nk it was he. You
would be awfully touched, awfully pleased--set up. And you were. I saw
that you were when we all came into the room. You went over and stood
by him. You put your hand on his arm. I said, 'You divine,
beautiful, tender thing, now I'll go through the fire to get you....'"

Lucy had covered her face with her hands; but now she lifted it and
showed him as it might be the eyes of an Assessing Angel.

"You went through no fire at all. But you put me in the fire." But he
continued as if she had said nothing material.

"I had made up my mind to be satisfied. I thought if I could see you
exalted, proud of what you had, that would be enough. But you found
him out; and then you found me out too ... and we never spoke of it.
But there it was, Lucy, all the time; and there it is still, my
dear--"

Her face was aflame, but her eyes clear and cold. "No," she said,
"it's not there. There is nothing there at all. You are nothing to me
but a thought of shame. I think I deserve all that you can say--but
surely you have said enough to me now. I must leave you if you go on
with this conversation. Nothing whatever is there--"

He laughed, not harshly, but comfortably, as a man does who is sure of
himself. "Yes, there is something there still. I count on that. There
is a common knowledge, unshared by any one but you and me. He would
have it so. I was ready to tell him everything, but he wouldn't hear
me. It was honourable of him. I admired him for it; but it left me
sharing something with you."

She stared at him, as if he had insulted her in the street.

"What can you mean? How could he want to hear from you what he knew
already from me?"

Urquhart went pale. Grey patches showed on his cheeks and spread like
dry places in the sand.

"You told him?"

"Everything. Two nights before you went."

He fell silent. His eyes left her face. Power seemed to leave him.

"That tears it," he said. "That does for me." He was so utterly
disconcerted that she could have pitied him.

"So that's why he didn't want to hear me! No wonder. But--why didn't
he tell me that he knew it? I taunted him with not knowing." He turned
towards her; his eyes were bright with fever. "If you know, perhaps
you'll tell me."

Lucy said proudly, "I believe I know. He didn't want to change your
thoughts of me." He received that in silence.

Then he said, "By George, he's a better man than I am."

Lucy said, "Yes, he is." Her head was very fixe