"Go on. Did he say that?"

"Yes."

"But with all my fine qualities of mind and heart," said I, "I lost

all when I lost my money!"

"What do you mean?"

"I'll tell you what I mean--you dropped me because you thought me

poor. Well, I don't blame you. It takes money to live, and you

deserved all that the world can give. I don't blame you. There were

other men in the world for you. The trouble with me was that there was

no other woman in the world for me. All our trouble--all our many

meetings and partings--have come out of those two facts."

"Did you think that of me?" she asked at length, slowly. I suppose she

was pale, but I could not see.

"I certainly did. How could I think anything else?"

"Harry!" she half whispered. "Why, Harry, Harry!"

"Admit that you did!" I exclaimed bitterly, "and let me start from

that as a premise. Listen! If you were a man, and loved a woman, and

she chucked you when you lost your money, do you think you'd break

your neck to make any more success in the world after that? Why should

you? Why does a man work? It's for a home, for the sake of power, and

mostly for the sake of the game."

"Yes."

"And I could play that game--I can play it now, and win at it, any

time I like. I quit it not because I was afraid of the game--it's the

easiest thing in the world to make money, if that's all you really

want to do. That's all your father wanted, or mine, and it was easy. I

can play that game. But why? Ah! if it were to win a quiet home, the

woman I loved, independence, usefulness, contentment,--yes! But when

all those stakes were out of the game, Helena, I didn't care to play

it any more. And that was why you thought I ran away. I did run

away--from myself, and you."

She was silent now, and perhaps paler--I could not see.

"--But wherever I have gone, Helena, all over the world, I've found

those two people there ahead of me, and I couldn't escape

them--myself, and you!"

"Did you think that of me, Harry?" She half whispered once more.

"Yes, I did. And did you think that of me?"

"Yes, I did. But I did not understand."

"No. Like many a woman, you got cause and effect mixed up: and you

never troubled yourself to get it straight. Let me tell you, unless

two people can come to each other without compromises and without

explanations and without reservations, they would better never come

at all. I don't want you cheap, you oughtn't to want me cheap. So how

can it end any way other than the way it has? If it was my loss of

fortune that made you chuck me, I oughtn't ever to give you a second

thought, for you wouldn't be worth it. The fact you did, and that I

do, hasn't anything to do with it at all."




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