d the van der Luydens and
they collapsed. He laughed, and sacrificed them.

Nastasia brought the tea, with handleless Japanese cups and little
covered dishes, placing the tray on a low table.

"But you'll explain these things to me--you'll tell me all I ought to
know," Madame Olenska continued, leaning forward to hand him his cup.

"It's you who are telling me; opening my eyes to things I'd looked at
so long that I'd ceased to see them."

She detached a small gold cigarette-case from one of her bracelets,
held it out to him, and took a cigarette herself. On the chimney were
long spills for lighting them.

"Ah, then we can both help each other. But I want help so much more.
You must tell me just what to do."

It was on the tip of his tongue to reply: "Don't be seen driving about
the streets with Beaufort--" but he was being too deeply drawn into the
atmosphere of the room, which was her atmosphere, and to give advice of
that sort would have been like telling some one who was bargaining for
attar-of-roses in Samarkand that one should always be provided with
arctics for a New York winter. New York seemed much farther off than
Samarkand, and if they were indeed to help each other she was rendering
what might prove the first of their mutual services by making him look
at his native city objectively. Viewed thus, as through the wrong end
of a telescope, it looked disconcertingly small and distant; but then
from Samarkand it would.

A flame darted from the logs and she bent over the fire, stretching her
thin hands so close to it that a faint halo shone about the oval nails.
The light touched to russet the rings of dark hair escaping from her
braids, and made her pale face paler.

"There are plenty of people to tell you what to do," Archer rejoined,
obscurely envious of them.

"Oh--all my aunts? And my dear old Granny?" She considered the idea
impartially. "They're all a little vexed with me for setting up for
myself--poor Granny especially. She wanted to keep me with her; but I
had to be free--" He was impressed by this light way of speaking of
the formidable Catherine, and moved by the thought of what must have
given Madame Olenska this thirst for even the loneliest kind of
freedom. But the idea of Beaufort gnawed him.

"I think I understand how you feel," he said. "Still, your family can
advise you; explain differences; show you the way."

She lifted her thin black eyebrows. "Is New York such a lab