r change as Time went on, and alter into the
close union that physically and mentally makes happiness for men and women
who love? Is that what you ask me, Miss Mildare?"

She looked at him full and bent her head. And the man's heart, that had
throbbed so wildly, stopped beating with a sudden jerk, and the divine
fire that burned and tingled in his blood died out, and the cold sickness
of baffled hope weighed on him like a mantle of lead. And the voice that
had whispered to him so alluringly, telling him that it was not too late,
that he might even yet win this virginal pure, sweetly-budding maiden, and
know the bliss of being loved at last, sank into silence. His face was
set like granite, and as grey. His eyes burned darkly under his heavy
brows. He waited, sombrely and hopelessly, for her to speak again.

"There are such marriages----?"

The question was diffidently and timidly put. He answered:

"Assuredly there are. But not between those who are--physically and
mentally, sane and healthy men and women,--at least, in my experience. One
case, of three I am at liberty to quote, was that of an aged and wealthy
woman of position and a young and rising public man."

"Were--weren't they happy?"

The face of the inward, unseen Saxham was twisted in a miserable grin, but
the outward man preserved immobility.

"He enjoyed life. She sat by, and saw, every day joining nearer, her
death, that was to leave him free."

"And the others?"

She asked it with an indrawn breath of anxiety.

"The second case was that of a man, middle-aged and helplessly paralysed
by an accident in the hunting-field, and of a beautiful and high-spirited
young woman--almost a girl. She took a romantic interest in him--talked of
his ruined career and blighted life, and all that sort of thing. And--they
married, and she found her bondage intolerable.... It ended in his
divorcing her. The _decree nisi_ was made absolute a few days before I
left London. The third case bears more analogy to yours and mine."

"Please go on."

"There was no great disparity of age between these two people. They were
sympathetic, cultured, independent both. Their views upon many
subjects--including the sex question--were identical," said Saxham slowly.
"And they entered into a bond of union that had for its ultimate aim the
culture of the intellect and the development of what they called the Soul.
The Flesh had nothing in it; the Body," said Saxham, with a grating
sa