she came
to the Sermon on the Mount. Then she began to read. And presently, as
she read, a queer thought came to her. "If the 'old guard' could see me
now!"

It was late when she stopped reading. She shut up the Holy Book, put it
back on the shelf, and took down a volume of poems. And after reading
the Bible she read the poem of the Wild Heart. And then she read nothing
more. But her reading had waked up in her a longing which was not
familiar to her except in connexion with what she supposed was the baser
part of her, the part which had troubled, had even tortured her so many
times in her life. She had often longed to do things for men whom she
loved, or fancied she loved. Now she was conscious of a yearning
more altruistic. She wished to be purely unselfish, if that were ever
possible. And she believed it to be possible. For was not Seymour
unselfish? He surely often forgot himself in her. But she had always
remembered herself in others.

"What a monstrous egoist I have been all my life!" she thought, with
a sense of despair. "Only once have I acted with a purely unselfish
motive, and that was with Beryl. Yes, Beryl gave me the one opportunity
I took advantage of. And now it is all over. Everything is finished. It
is too late to try a new way of living."

She forgot many little sacrifices she had made in the war, or she did
not count them to her credit. For patriotism in war seemed as natural
to her as drawing breath. She was thinking of her personal life in
connexion with individuals. She had once been unselfish--for Beryl. That
was over. Everything was over. And yet Seymour had said that he felt as
if at last she were coming into possession of her true self. So he had
noticed a difference. It was as if what she had been able to do for
Beryl had subtly altered her. But there was nothing more for her to do.

That evening she felt loneliness as she had never felt it before. A sort
of mental nausea seized her as she dressed for her solitary dinner.
For whom was she changing her gown? For Murgatroyd! How grotesque the
unwritten regulations of a life like hers were! Why go down to dinner
at all? She had no appetite. Nevertheless, everything was done in due
order. Her hair was arranged. Cecile looked at her critically to see
that everything was right. For Murgatroyd! Even a jewel was brought to
be pinned in to the front of her gown. It was a big ruby surrounded
by diamonds, and as it flashed in the light it brought ba