racle of your womanhood that I
shall never fathom."

"If you set it down to your own manhood, you might be nearer the mark.
You are very much too humble, Eldred; and I love you for it,--always
did."

"Always?"

"I verily believe so."

"Good God! I never misjudged you, did I? If you . . . cared _then_,
why ever did you leave me?"

"Because you gave me no time to take it in. But I am sure now that the
germ was there. I think your . . . kisses must have waked it into
life. That was why they upset me so. And when I came back, I meant
to . . . Oh why should we rake it all up again? It hurts too much."

"But I must know everything now, Quita. You meant to tell me,--was
that it?"

"Yes. Though I own it was rather late in the day. Then you sprang it
upon me with that letter. I detest the man who wrote it, and I always
shall. There was just enough of truth in it, and in your bitter
reproaches, to make me feel the hopelessness of lame explanations.
Besides, your anger frightened me, though I didn't show it; and I
simply acted on a blind impulse to escape from the unknown things
ahead; to get back to the love and work I could understand."

"My poor darling! What a blackguard I was to you!"

"Hush! You are not to say that."

"I will. It's true. But . . . didn't you care a great deal for the
other chap?"

"I imagined I did. Girls can't always analyse new feelings of that
sort. I can see now that it was chiefly mental sympathy between us, on
my side at least. But I only discovered that when the real thing
came--in a flash."

"When was that?" he asked on a note of eagerness.

"One May morning on the Kajiar road! I knew then that I must have
cared always, without guessing it. But your coolness roused my pride;
and I vowed that if you had wiped me out of your heart, I would die
sooner than let you suspect my discovery. Yet all the while I longed
for you to know it; and in the end, goaded by your blindness, and your
astonishing want of conceit, I break my pride into a hundred little
bits. _Ai-je ete assez femme_?" she concluded with a whimsical smile.

One of her hands lay on the grass beside him. He covered it with his
own.

"And was the amazing discovery responsible for the Garth episode?" His
tone had a hint of anxiety.

"For the latter part of it, yes; though we have been friends all the
winter. He is at least moderately intelligent; and an intelligent
egoist is always interesting. B