 it employs all my best
natural powers as no other would. As for highest in the absolute sense, that is
a different matter. Possibly the life of a hospital nurse, of a sister of mercy
- something of that kind - comes nearest to the ideal.«
    She glanced at him, evidently in the same kind of doubt about his meaning as
he had recently felt about hers.
    »Why should you speak contemptuously of such people?«
    »Contemptuously? I speak sincerely. In a world where pain is the most
obvious fact, the task of mercy must surely take precedence of most others.«
    »I am surprised to hear you say this.«
    It was spoken in the tone most characteristic of her, that of a proud
condescension.
    »Why, Mrs. Baske?«
    She hesitated a little, but made answer:
    »I don't mean, that I think you unfeeling, but your interests seem to be so
far from such simple things.«
    »True.«
    Again a long silence. The carriage was descending the road from Pozzuoli; it
approached the sea-shore, where the gentle breakers were beginning to be tinged
with evening light. Cecily looked back and waved her hand.
    »When you say that art is an end in itself,« Miriam resumed abruptly, »you
claim, I suppose, that it is a way of serving mankind?«
    Mallard was learning the significance of her tones. In this instance, he
knew that the words serving mankind were a contemptuous use of a phrase she had
heard, a phrase which represented the philosophy alien to her own.
    »Indeed, I claim nothing of the kind,« he replied, laughing. »Art may, or
may not, serve such a purpose; but be assured that the artist never thinks of
his work in that way.«
    »You make no claim, then, even of usefulness?«
    »Most decidedly, none. You little imagine how distasteful the word is to me
in such connection.«
    »Then how can you say you are employing your best natural powers?«
    She had fallen to ingenuous surprise, and Mallard again laughed, partly at
the simplicity of the question, partly because it pleased him to have brought
her to such directness.
    »Because,« he answered, »this work gives me keener and more lasting pleasure
than any other would. And I am not a man easily pleased with my own endeavours,
Mrs. Baske. I work with little or no hope of ever satisfying myself - that is
another thing. I have heard men speak of
