"But the brain--oh, it has such a tendency to overshadow, to browbeat
the heart. In its strength it so often grows arrogant. The _juste
milieu_--I think you have it. Be content, and never let your brain cry
out for more, lest your heart should have to put up with less."

"You think too well of me," he said; "much too well."

She leaned forward over the tea-table and looked at him closely, with
the peculiar scrutiny of one so strongly concentrated upon the matter in
hand as to be absolutely unself-conscious.

"I wonder if I do," she said; and he felt as if she were trying to drag
the very heart out of him and to see how it was beating. "I wonder if I
do."

She relaxed her muscles, which had been tense, and leaned back, letting
her right hand, which for a moment had grasped the edge of the table,
drop down on to her lap.

"It may be so. I do think well of you. That is certain. And I'm afraid I
think very often badly of men. And yet I do try to judge fairly, and not
only to put on the black cap because of my own unfortunate experiences.
There are such splendid men--but there are such utter brutes. You must
know that. And yet I doubt if a man ever knows how good, or how bad,
another man can be. Perhaps one must be a woman thoroughly to know a
man--man, the beast and the angel."

"I dare say that is true."

He spoke almost with conviction. For all the time he had been with her