whom we used to meet. She was the daughter of wealthy parents, and she
did as she liked with them; very beautiful, well educated, very good at
games--what they call a woman-athlete--and caring for nothing on earth
but her own amusement. She was one of the most unprincipled flirts I
ever knew, and quite the cleverest. Every one knew it, and Mr Marlowe
must have heard it; but she made a complete fool of him, brain and all.
I don't know how she managed it, but I can imagine. She liked him, of
course; but it was quite plain to me that she was playing with him. The
whole affair was so idiotic, I got perfectly furious. One day I asked
him to row me in a boat on the lake--all this happened at our house by
Lake George. We had never been alone together for any length of time
before. In the boat I talked to him. I was very kind about it, I think,
and he took it admirably, but he didn't believe me a bit. He had the
impudence to tell me that I misunderstood Alice's nature. When I hinted
at his prospects--I knew he had scarcely anything of his own--he said
that if she loved him he could make himself a position in the world. I
dare say that was true, with his abilities and his friends--he is rather
well connected, you know, as well as popular. But his enlightenment came
very soon after that.

'My husband helped me out of the boat when we got back. He joked with
Mr Marlowe about something, I remember; for through all that followed he
never once changed in his manner to him, and that was one reason why I
took so long to realize what he thought about him and myself. But to
me he was reserved and silent that evening--not angry. He was always
perfectly cold and expressionless to me after he took this idea into his
head. After dinner he only spoke to me once. Mr Marlowe was telling him
about some horse he had bought for the farm in Kentucky, and my husband
looked at me and said, "Marlowe may be a gentleman, but he seldom quits
loser in a horse-trade." I was surprised at that, but at that time--and
even on the next occasion when he found us together--I didn't understand
what was in his mind. That next time was the morning when Mr
Marlowe received a sweet little note from the girl asking for his
congratulations on her engagement. It was in our New York house.
He looked so wretched at breakfast that I thought he was ill, and
afterwards I went to the room where he worked, and asked what was the
matter. He didn't say anything, but just handed me