"You can--what?"

It was the last touch, not only of the horror of the situation, but of
its ludicrous irony.

"I can work, dear," Mrs. Eveleth repeated, with the poignant
tranquillity that smote Diane more cruelly than grief. "There are many
things I could do--"

"Oh, don't!" Diane wailed, with pleading gestures of the hands. "Oh,
don't! I can't bear it. Don't say such things. They kill me. There must
be some mistake. All that money can't have gone. Even if it was only a
few hundred thousand francs, it would be something. I will not believe
it. It's too soon to judge. I've heard it took a long time to settle up
estates. How can they have done it yet?"

"They haven't. They've only seen its possibilities--and
impossibilities."

"I will never believe it," Diane burst out again. "I will see those men.
I will tell them. I am positive that it cannot be. Such injustice would
not be permitted. There must be laws--there must be something--to
prevent such outrage--especially on you!" She spoke vehemently, striding
to and fro in the little room, and brushing back from time to time the
heavy brown hair that in her excitement fell in disordered locks on her
forehead. "It's too wicked. It's too monstrous. It's intolerable. God
doesn't allow such things to happen on earth, otherwise He wouldn't be
God! No, no; you cannot make me think that such things happen. You work!
The Mater Dolorosa herself was not called upon to bear such humiliation.
If God reigns, as they say He does--"