f him stabbed her with daggers of which he had no idea.
She was dismayed at the recollection of her talk with her brother the
evening before, of the ease and certitude with which she had laid down
her conditions, of not giving up her career, of remaining the famous
Miss Falbe, of refusing to take a dishonoured place in the sacred
circle of the Combers. Now, when she was face to face with his love, so
ineloquently expressed, so radically a part of him, she knew that there
was nothing in the world, external to him and her, that could enter into
their reckonings; but into their reckonings there had not entered the
one thing essential. She gave him sympathy, liking, friendliness, but
she did not want him with her blood. And though it was not humanly
possible that she could want him with more than that, it was not
possible that she could take him with less.

"Yes, that is the most I can do for you at present," she said.

Still quite quietly he moved away from her, so that he stood free of her
hands.

"I have been constantly here all these last months," he said. "Now that
you know what I have told you, do you want not to see me?"

That stabbed her again.

"Have I implied that?" she asked.

"Not directly. But I can easily understand its being a bore to you. I
don't want to bore you. That would be a very stupid way of trying to
make you care for me. As I said, that is my job. I haven't accomplished
it as yet. But I mean to. I only ask you for a hint."

She understood her own feeling better than he. She understood at least
that she was dealing with things that were necessarily incalculable.

"I can't give you a hint," she said. "I can't make any plans about it.
If you were a woman perhaps you would understand. Love is, or it isn't.
That is all I know about it."

But Michael persisted.

"I only know what you have taught me," he said. "But you must know
that."

In a flash she became aware that it would be impossible for her to
behave to Michael as she had behaved to him for several months past.
She could not any longer put a hand on his shoulder, beat time with her
fingers on his arm, knowing that the physical contact meant nothing to
her, and all--all to him. The rejection of him as a lover rendered the
sisterly attitude impossible. And not only must she revise her conduct,
but she must revise the mental attitude of which it was the physical
counterpart. Up till this moment she had looked at the situation from
her o