 she stretched out her
hand to the mantel - piece, and so stood, between him and the light, her
admirable figure designed on a glimmering background.
    »I know why you say nothing,« she continued, abruptly but without
resentment. »You cannot use words of sympathy which would be anything but
formal, and you prefer to let me understand that. It is like you. Oh, you
mustn't think I mean the phrase as a reproach. Anything but that. I mean that
you were always honest, and time hasn't changed you - in that.« A slight, very
slight, tremor on the close. »I'd rather you behaved to me like your old self. A
sham sympathy would drive me mad.«
    »I said nothing,« he replied, »only because words seemed meaningless.«
    »Not only that. You feel for me, I know, because you are not heartless; but
at the same time you obey your reason, which tells you that all I suffer comes
of my own self-will.«
    »I should like you to think better of me than that. I'm not one of those
people, I hope, who use every accident to point a moral, and begin by inventing
the moral to suit their own convictions. I know all the details of your
misfortune.«
    »Oh, wasn't it cruel that she should take such revenge upon me!« Her voice
rose in unrestrained emotion. »Just because she envied me that poor bit of
advantage over her! How could I be expected to refuse the chance that was
offered? It would have been no use; she couldn't have kept the part. And I was
so near success. I had never had a chance of showing what I could do. It wasn't
much of a part, really, but it was the lead, at all events, and it would have
made people pay attention to me. You don't know how strongly I was always drawn
to the stage; there I found the work for which I was meant. And I strove so hard
to make my way. I had no friends, no money. I earned only just enough to supply
my needs. I know what people think about actresses. Mr. Kirkwood, do you imagine
I have been living at my ease, congratulating myself that I had escaped from all
hardships?«
    He could not raise his eyes. As she still awaited his answer, he said in
rather a hard voice:
    »As I have
