an island of refuge in a sea of doubt, she had been about
to clasp was but an empty shadow. That Wilmot had not done very nobly
with his talents, that there were weaknesses in his character and
record, things even that needed explaining, had not at the moment of his
mastery mattered to her a jot. But now such thoughts flocked to her like
birds to a tree; and she was glad that she had escaped from a situation
that had so nearly overwhelmed her reason and drowned her common sense
in the heavenly sweetness of surrender.

Wilmot could find nothing to say. It was no mere gust of passion that
had swept over him, but a storm. He was physically tired, as if he had
rowed a long race. He no longer wished to play the master. He would
rather a thousand times have rested his hot forehead on Barbara's cool
hand, and fallen quietly asleep like a little child come in at last to
his mother after too much play in the hot sun.

"Life," he said at last, "is a nuisance, Barbs. Isn't it? Would you,
honestly, be happier if I disappeared, and never bothered you again?
Sometimes I feel that I ought to."

She shook her head. "If you like people," she said, "you like them,
faults and all. I'm dependent on you in a hundred ways. You're the
oldest and best friend I've got. If you disappeared I'd curl up and die.
But now that we are talking personalities, you very nearly forgot
yourself a few minutes ago. Well, I forgive. But it mustn't
happen again."

He bowed his head very humbly. "I will go back to patience and
gentleness," he said, "and give them another trial."

"I wish," she said, "that you would go back and begin your life over
again--stop drifting and sail for some definite harbor."

"I will," he said, "on condition--"

"No--no--no," she said hurriedly, "no condition. I am in no position to
make conditions, if that's what you mean. I don't understand myself. I
don't trust myself. I will not undertake to bind myself to you or any
one until I know that I can trust myself. It would be very jolly for you
if I married you and then we found that I really loved the other fellow.
I'm like that--selfish, unstable, susceptible--and very much ashamed of
myself. I wouldn't talk myself down so if you didn't know these things
as well as I do. Why you go on caring for me is a mystery. I'm no good.
And I'm not even sorry enough to cry about it--ever. I've actually
thought that I was in love--oh, ever so many times: sometimes with you.
What's the us