ight, the
spoils to go to the victor."

"Horrible! But you might have been the victor? In that case,
would you have loved her, would you have used her well, all your
life, and hers?"

He drew back now with dignity. "Madam, my position in later years
defends me from necessity of answering you. You are young,
impulsive, but you should not forget the proprieties even now--"
His face was now hotly flushed.

"I ask your pardon! But _would_ you?"

He smiled in spite of himself, something of the old fire of
gallantry still burning in his withered veins. "My dear girl, if
it were yourself, I would! And by the Lord! I'd play again with
Parish, or any other man, if my chance otherwise, merely by cruel
circumstances, had been left hopeless. Some one must win."

"But how could the winner be sure? How could the--how did she--I
would say--"

"Dear girl, let us not be too cold in our philosophy, nor too wise.
I can not say how or why these things go as they do. All I know is
that the right man won in that case, and that he proved it later,
by each act of kindness he gave her, all her life. This, my dear,
is an odd world, when it comes to all that."

"Was he--did he have anybody else in the world who--"

"Oh, only a wife, I believe, that was all!"

"Did she die, soon? Was there ever--"

"How you question! What do you plan for _yourself_? My word! You
are putting me through a strange initiation on our first
acquaintance, my dear Countess! Let us not pursue such matters
further, or I shall begin to think your own interest in these
questions is that of the original Eve!"

"To the victor does not always belong the spoils," she said slowly.
"Not till he has won--earned them--in war, in conquest! Perhaps
conquest of himself."

[Illustration: "To the victor does not always belong the spoils."]

"You speak in enigmas for me, my dear Countess."

She shook her head slowly, from side to side. "That poor girl!
Did she ever feel she had been won in the real game, I wonder? To
whom would belong herself--if she felt that she had something in
her own life to forget, some great thing to be done, in penance
perhaps, in eagerness perhaps, some step to take, up--something to
put her into a higher plane in the scheme of life? To do
something, for some one else--not just to be selfish--suppose that
was in her heart; after that game?"

"Why, you read her story as though you saw it! That was her life,
absolutely. N