ould know that
after such a girl as she is I couldn't think of any other woman; the
thing is simply impossible."

"That's the theory."

"Theory? It's the practice!"

"Certain exceptions."

"There's no exception in my case. No, sir! I tell you this thing is for
all time--for eternity. It makes me or it mars me, once for all. She may
listen to me or she may not listen, but as long as she lives there's no
other woman alive for me."

"Better go and tell her so. You're wasting your arguments on me."

"Why?"

"Because I'm convinced already. Because people always marry their first
and only loves. Because people never marry twice for love. Because I've
never seen you hit before, and I know you never could be again. Now go
and convince Miss Pasmer. She'll believe you, because she'll know that
she can never care for any one but you, and you naturally can't care for
anybody but her. It's a perfectly clear case. All you've got to do is to
set it before her."

"If I were you, I wouldn't try to work that cynical racket, Boardman,"
said Mavering. He rose, but he sighed drearily, and regarded Boardman's
grin with lack-lustre absence. But he went away without saying anything
more; and walked mechanically toward the Cavendish. As he rang at the
door of Mrs. Pasmer's apartments he recalled another early visit he had
paid there; he thought how joyful and exuberant he was then, and how
crushed and desperate now. He was not without youthful satisfaction in
the disparity of his different moods; it seemed to stamp him as a man of
large and varied experience.

XXXVIII.

Mrs. Pasmer was genuinely surprised to see Mavering, and he pursued his
advantage--if it was an advantage--by coming directly to the point. He
took it for granted that she knew all about the matter, and he threw
himself upon her mercy without delay.

"Mrs. Pasmer, you must help me about this business with Alice," he broke
out at once. "I don't know what to make of it; but I know I can explain
it. Of course," he added, smiling ruefully, "the two statements don't
hang together; but what I mean is that if I can find out what the
trouble is, I can make it all right, because there's nothing wrong about
it; don't you see?"

Mrs. Pasmer tried to keep the mystification out of her eye; but she
could not even succeed in seeming to do so, which she would have liked
almost as well.

"Don't you know what I mean?" asked Dan.

Mrs. Pasmer chanced it. "That Alice was a