with the best of
reasons."

Mary was staring out of the window. She recalled that she had faced
the fact of the old mind in the young brain when she first discovered
that she loved Clavering. How could she have forgotten . . . for a few
short weeks--and up there? . . . She raised her eyes to the mountain.
From where she sat she could not see the top. It looked like an
impenetrable rampart, rising to the skies.

"Can you tell me with honesty and candor," he continued in those same
gentle tones that had always reminded her of limpid water running over
iron, "--and for all your subtlety your mind is too arrogant and
fearless to be otherwise than honest _au fond_--that you believe you
could remain satisfied with love alone? For more, let us say, than a
year?"

She moved restlessly. "Perhaps not. But I had planned to live in
Vienna. He would spend only a part of the year there with me. His own
interests are here, of course. It would be a perfectly workable
arrangement."

"Are you sure? If you are, I must conclude that in the mental
confusion love so often induces, you have lost temporarily your
remarkable powers of clear and coherent thought. Do you not realize
that you would no longer be Graefin Zattiany, you would be Mrs. Lee
Clavering? Do you imagine for a moment that you could play the great
role in Austrian affairs you have set yourself, handicapped by an
American name--and an American husband? Not with all your gifts, your
wealth, your genius for playing on that complex instrument called human
nature. Austria may be a Republic of sorts, but it is still Austria.
You would be an American and an outsider--a presumptuous interloper."

She stared at him aghast. "I--oh!--I had not thought of that. It
seems incomprehensible--but I had never thought of myself as Mrs.
Clavering. I have been Graefin Zattiany so long!"

"And your plans were well-defined, and your ambition to play a great
role on the modern European stage possessed you utterly until you met
this young man--is it not so?"

"Oh, yes, but----"

"I understand. It must have been a quite marvellous experience, after
those barren years, to feel yourself glowing with all the vitalities of
youth once more; to bring young men to your feet with a glance and to
fancy yourself in love----"

"Fancy!" She interrupted him passionately. "I am in love--and
more--more than I ever was with you. Until I met him I did not even
guess that I had the cap