u away on account of anyone
else. Ulick must go too."

"That does not make it any better for me. By God, I'd sooner that he got
you than that infernal religion. Evelyn, Evelyn, it is impossible that
an idea, a mere idea, should take you from me. It is inhuman, unnatural,
I can't realise it!"

"Owen, you must go now."

"Evelyn, I don't understand. It is just as if you told me you were
tallow, and would melt if there was a fire lighted. But never mind, I'll
accept your ideas--I'll accept anything. Let us be married to-morrow."

She was frightened in the depths of her feelings, and seemed to lose all
control of her will.

"Owen, I cannot marry you. Why do you ask me? You know it is now more
than ever impossible."

His face changed expression, but he was urged forward by an irresistible
force that seemed to rise up from the bottom of his being and blind his
eyes.

"You don't love him, it was only a caprice; we'll think no more about
it."

She sought the truth in her soul, but it seemed to elude her. She was
like a blind person in a vague, unknown space, and not being able to
discover the reason why she refused him, she insisted that Ulick was the
reason.

"Are you going to marry him?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Don't you wish to? He is your father's friend."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Destiny, I suppose."

The question was too profound for discussion, and they sat silent for a
long while. A chance remark turned their talk upon Balzac, and Owen
spoke about _Le Lys dans la Vallee_, and she asked him if he remembered
the day he had first spoken to her about Balzac.

"It was the day you took me to the races, our first week in Paris."

"And a few days afterwards I took you to Madame Savelli's. She told you
that you had the most beautiful voice she had ever heard. You could not
speak; you were so excited that I was obliged to send you off for a
drive in the Bois. Do you remember?"

"Yes, I remember.... You were always very good to me."

They talked on and on, conscious of the hands of the clock moving on
towards their divided lives. When it struck seven, she said he must go,
but he begged to be allowed to stay till a quarter past, and in this
last period he urged that their separation should not be final. He
pleaded that a time should be set on his alienation, and ended by
extracting from her a sort of half promise that she would allow him to
come and see her in three months. But he and she knew that