ugh stiff lips, "You mustn't
hope for that. You know I told you long ago the kind of woman I am."

"And you can't change yourself for my sake?"

She moved uneasily. "I would, so gladly, if I could," she said, and he
shook his head as though he did not believe her.

"But I will not have you and John trying to arrange my life. I choose to
be alone. If you interfere--" His look reproached her. "I'm sorry,
Zebedee, but I'm suffering, too, and I know best about George, about
myself. After all"--her voice rose and broke--"after all, I've married
him! Oh, what a fuss, what a fuss! We make too much of it. We have to
bear it. We are not willing to bear anything. Other women, other men,
have lost what they loved best. We want too much. We were not meant for
happiness."

His hand was on the door, but he came back and stood close to her. "Do
you think you have been talking to a stone? What do you expect of me?
I"--he held his head--"I am trying to keep sane. To you, this may be a
small thing among greater ones, but to me--it's the only one."

"To me, too. But if I made a mistake in promising, I should make another
in running away now. One has to do one's best."

"And this is a woman's best!" he said in a voice she did not know.

"Is that so bad?" She was looking at a stranger: she was in an empty
world, a black, wild place, and in it she could not find Zebedee.

"There is no logic in it," she heard him say, and she was in her room
once more, holding to the bed-rail, standing near this haggard travesty
of her man.

"Oh! What have I done to you?" she cried out.

He followed his own thought. "If your sense of duty is greater towards
him than towards me, why don't you go to him and give him all he wants?"

"He has not asked for it."

"And I do. If he has no rights, remember mine; but if he has them--"

"Yes, it may come to that," she said, and he saw her lined, white face.

"No, no, Helen! Not for my sake this time, but for yours! No! I didn't
mean it. Believe me, I could be glad if you were happy."

"I shan't be happy without you, but if I can't have you, why shouldn't I
do my best for him?"

He looked at the floor and said, "Helen, I can't let him touch you." He
looked up. "Have you thought of everything?"

"There have been days and days to think in."

"My dear, it isn't possible! To give you into his hands!"

"I shall keep out of them if I can, and no one else can do it for me.
Remember that, or you will push m