ust saying that we had known each other so long."

"Yes. But--all sorts of things have happened in that time, you know. I
am not the same as I was when I first knew you."

"No. You are married. That is one great difference."

"Too great," said she. "Honestly, do you think me improved since my
marriage?"

"Improved? No. Why should you improve? You are just what you were meant
to be, as you always were."

"I know. You called me a perfect woman a little while ago, and you said
my surroundings were imperfect. You must have meant that they did not
suit me, or that I did not suit them. Which was it?"

"They ought to suit you," said Griggs. "If they do not, it is not your
fault."

"But I might have done something to make them suit me. I sometimes think
that I have not treated them properly."

"Why should you blame yourself? You did not make them, and they cannot
unmake you. You have a right to be yourself. Everybody has. It is the
first right. Your surroundings owe you more than you owe to them,
because you are what you are, and they are not what they ought to be.
Let them bear the blame. As for not treating them properly, no one could
accuse you of that."

"I do not know--some one might. People are so strange, sometimes."

She stopped, and he answered nothing. Looking down into the open piano,
she idly watched the hammers move as she pressed the keys softly with
one hand.

"Some people are just like this," she said, smiling, and repeating the
action. "If you touch them in a certain way, they answer. If you press
them gently, they do not understand. Do you see? The hammer comes just
up to the string, and then falls back again without making any noise. I
suppose those are my surroundings. Sometimes they answer me, and
sometimes they do not. I like things I can be sure of."

"And by things you mean people," suggested Griggs.

"Of course."

"And by your surroundings you mean--what?"

"You know," she answered in a low voice, turning her face still further
away from him.

"Reanda?"

She hesitated for a moment, knowing that her answer must have weight on
the man.

"I suppose so," she said at last. "I ought not to say so--ought I? Tell
me the truth."

"The truth is, you are unhappy," he answered slowly. "There is no reason
why you should not tell me so. Perhaps I might help you, if you would
let me."

He almost regretted that he had said so much, little as it was. But she
had wished him to say it, and more