uld thrust them
both--as much against his will as hers--into a position in which she
would have to choose between seeming, not to say being, ungrateful, and
playing the hypocrite, perhaps basely, with him. The little general
eluded, Stanley voluntarily removed; she was indeed free. Now she
could work with an untroubled mind, could show Mrs. Brindley that
intelligent and persistent work--her "biggest if in all the world"--was
in fact a very simple matter.

She had not been settled at Mrs. Brindley's many hours before she
discovered that not only was she free from all hindrances, but was to
have a positive and great help. Mrs. Brindley's talent for putting
people at their ease was no mere drawing-room trick.

She made Mildred feel immediately at home, as she had not felt at home
since her mother introduced James Presbury into their house at Hanging
Rock. Mrs. Brindley was absolutely devoid of pretenses. When Mildred
spoke to her of this quality in her she said:

"I owe that to my husband. I was brought up like everybody else--to be
more or less of a poser and a hypocrite. In fact, I think there was
almost nothing genuine about me. My husband taught me to be myself, to
be afraid of nobody's opinion, to show myself just as I was and to let
people seek or avoid me as they saw fit. He was that sort of man
himself."

"He must have been a remarkable man," said Mildred.

"He was," replied Mrs. Brindley. "But not attractive--at least not to
me. Our marriage was a mistake. We quarreled whenever we were not at
work with the music. If he had not died, we should have been
divorced." She smiled merrily. "Then he would have hired me as his
musical secretary, and we'd have got on beautifully."

Mildred was still thinking of Mrs. Brindley's freedom from pretense.
"I've never dared be myself," confessed she. "I don't know what myself
really is like. I was thinking the other day how for one reason and
another I've been a hypocrite all my life. You see, I've always been a
dependent--have always had to please someone in order to get what I
wanted."

"You can never be yourself until you have an independent income,
however small," said Mrs. Brindley. "I've had that joy only since my
husband died. It's as well that I didn't have it sooner. One is the
better for having served an apprenticeship at self-repression and at
pretending to virtues one has not. Only those who earn their freedom
know how to use it. If I had h