into the divan, leaning on her
hand, with something like the glory of a dream on her face. Standing
in front of her, he said slowly:

"I'm entirely free. No one in the world depends upon me. I have no
tie, or bond to my life. I have freedom and money. So far--if what
you say is all true, don't start so, for I believe it, every word--so
far, I have spoiled your life."

But the girl shook her head.

"Oh, no, _you haven't_," she assured him. "We make our own lives, I
expect, and I told you that I could remember everything you ever said
to me in the past--you never lied to me, and you were never anything
but kind and dear. I've been a fool, a fool!"

Sitting there in her fragile evening dress, its ruffles torn where they
had trailed across the pebbles in the street, the disorder of the room
around her, its evidence of a homeless, wandering life, she seemed like
a bit of flotsam that, no matter from what ship it had been blown, had
at last drifted along the shore to his feet. Unhappy and deserted, she
reached the very tenderest part of Bulstrode's nature. Cost him what
it would, he must save her.

But, as though the girl, with an instinctive fineness divined, she rose
and going over to him very gently, laid her hand on his shoulder:

"You must go _now_: that is what I ask you to do. I have seemed, and
indeed I have thrown myself upon your mercy; but, in reality, I don't
do any such thing. You will soon forget me, as you have been able to
do all these years. The table is full of your money. I am poor, and
yet I don't take it. Doesn't _that_ prove a little my good faith?
Doesn't it? Only think of me as the most romantic dreamer you ever
saw, and of nothing more. Oh, _no_," she breathed softly, "_no_, a
thousand times...!

"I've answered your question before you've asked it! No, I couldn't;
no woman who wants love is content with pity. I would rather starve
than take money from you although I have lived on your money for years.
I would rather be unhappy than take what you could offer me for love.
You mustn't speak; you mustn't ask me. The temptation is very great,
you know, and it _might_ wreck me. No, Mr. Bulstrode, and the reason
why I say it is because I've seen."

"'I've seen?'" he repeated her words. "You've seen, but what do you
mean--what have you seen?"

"I'm going to tell you why I sent for Prince Pollona, although you
don't ask me. I came to Trouville alone. I saw you; I've watched yo