t explain. Once he had
desired her passionately. The ivory-white of her daintiness had fired
his blood. He had fought with beasts. He had wrestled with his soul in
the night watches. He had loved her purely and sweetly, too. But now, as
she stood before him, recoiling a little from his fixed stare of pain,
though she had suffered but little loss in beauty and in that of her
which was desirable, he realised, in a kind of paralysis, that he
desired her no more, that he loved her no more with the idealised love
he had given to the elfin princess of his dreams. Not that he would not
still do her infinite service. The pathos of her broken life moved him
to an anguish of pity. For her soothing he would give all that life held
for him, save one thing--which was no longer his to give. Another man
glib of tongue and crafty of brain might have lied his way out of an
abominable situation. But Jaffery's craft was of the simplest. He could
not trick the dead love into smiling semblance of life. His nature was
too primitive. He could only stare in spellbound affright at the icy
barrier that separated him from Doria.

"I see," she said tonelessly, moving slowly away from him. "Your
feelings have changed. I am sorry."

Then he found power of motion and speech. He threw out his arms. "My
God, dear, forgive me!" he groaned, and sat down and clutched his head
in his hands. She returned to the window and looked out at the rain. And
there she fought with her woman's indignant humiliation. And there was a
long, dead silence, broken only by the faintly heard notes of Susan's
piano in the nursery and the splash of water on the terrace.

Presently all that was good in Doria conquered. She crossed the room and
laid a light hand on Jaffery's head. It was the finest moment in her
life.

"One can't help these things. I know it too well. And no hearts are
broken. So it's all for the best."

He groaned again. "I didn't know. I'd like to shoot myself."

She smiled, conscious of feminine superiority. "If you did, I should
die, too. I tell you, it's all for the best. I love you as I never loved
you before. I usen't to love you a little bit. But I should have had to
learn to love you as a wife--and it might have been difficult."

A moment afterwards she appeared in the library, serenely
matter-of-fact. Liosha started round in her chair and looked defiantly
at her rival.

"Would both of you mind coming into the drawing-room for a minute?"

We f