rld, and to feel the
possibility of that----"

"I see," said Hilda, and perhaps she did. But his words oppressed her.
She got up with a movement which almost shook them off, and went to a
promiscuous looking-glass to remove her hat. She was refreshed and
vivified--she wanted to talk of the warm world. She let a decent
interval elapse, however; she waited till he took his hand from his
eyes. Even then, to make the transition easier, she said, "You ought to
be lifted up to-day, if you are going to baptise Kally Nath to-morrow."

"The Brother Superior will do it. And I don't know--I don't know. The
young woman he is to marry withdraws, I believe, if he comes over to
us----"

"The young woman he is to marry! Oh, my dear and reverend friend! _Avec
ces gens la!_ I have had a most amusing afternoon," she went on,
quickly. "I have taken off my hat, now let me remove your halo." She was
safe with her conceit; Arnold would always smile at any imputation of
saintship. He held himself a person of broad indulgences, and would
point openly to his consumption of tea cakes. But this afternoon a miasm
hung over him. Hilda saw it and bent herself, with her graphic recital,
to dispel it, perceived it thicken and settle down upon him, and went
bravely on to the end. Mr. Macandrew and Mr. Molyneux Sinclair lived and
spoke before him. It was comedy enough, in essence, to spread over a
matinee.

"And that is the sort of thing you store up and value," he said, when
she had finished. "These persons will add to your knowledge of life."

"Extremely," she replied to all of it.

"I suppose they will in their measure. But personally I could wish you
had not gone. Your work has no right to make such demands."

"Be reasonable," she said, flushing. "Don't talk as if personal dignity
were within the reach of everybody. It's the most expensive of
privileges. And nothing to be so very proud of--generally the product of
somebody else's humiliations, handed down. But the humiliations must
have been successful, handed down in cash. My father drove a cab and
died in debt. His name was Murphy. I shall be dignified some day--some
day! But you see I must make it possible myself, since nobody has done
it for me."

"Well, then, I'll alter my complaint. Why should you play with your
sincerity?"

"I didn't play with it," she flashed; "I abandoned it. I am an actress."

They often permitted themselves such candours; to all appearance their
discussion had