_could_ not! Think of your mother and father,
if you will not think of your husband and children. You terrify me!"

Hadria was moved with pity at Henriette's white quivering face.

"Don't trouble," she said, more gently. "There is no thunderbolt about
to fall in our discreet circle." (A hideous crash from the overturning
of one of Martha's Eiffel Towers seemed to belie the words.)

Miss Temperley's clutch relaxed, and she gave a gasp of relief.

"Tell me, Hadria, that you did not mean what you said."

"I can't do that, for I meant it, every syllable."

"Promise me then at least, that before you do anything to bring misery
and disgrace on us all, you will tell us of your intention, and give us
a chance of putting our side of the matter before you."

"Of protecting your vested interests," said Hadria; "your right of way
through my flesh and spirit."

"Of course you put it unkindly."

"I will not make promises for the future. The future is quite enough
hampered with the past, without setting anticipatory traps and springes
for unwary feet. But I refuse this promise merely on general principles.
I am not about to distress you in that particular way, though I think
you would only have yourselves to blame if I _were_."

Miss Temperley drew another deep breath, and the colour began to return
to her face.

"So far, so good," she said. "Now tell me--Is there nothing that would
make you accept your duties?"

"Even if I were to accept what you call my duties, it would not be in
the spirit that you would desire to see. It would be in cold
acknowledgment of the force of existing facts--facts which I regard as
preposterous, but admit to be coercive." Henriette sank wearily into her
chair.

"Do you then hold it justifiable for a woman to inflict pain on those
near to her, by a conduct that she may think justifiable in itself?"

Hadria hesitated for a moment.

"A woman is so desperately entangled, and restricted, and betrayed, by
common consent, in our society, that I hold her justified in using
desperate means, as one who fights for dear life. She may harden her
heart--if she can."

"I am thankful to think that she very seldom _can_!" cried Henriette.

"Ah! that is our weak point! For a long time to come, we shall be
overpowered by our own cage-born instincts, by our feminine conscience
that has been trained so cleverly to dog the woman's footsteps, in man's
interest--his detective in plain clothes!"

"Of course