"You are right, dearest; there are none," she returned with the
same calm, level voice. "It is true that I have at times tried to
do something real and womanly, and not, you know, merely to
complicate a--a"--her voice faltered--"theatrical situation--but I
couldn't! Something impelled me otherwise. Now you know why I
became an actress! But even there I fail! THEY are allowed
reasoning power off the stage--I have none at any time! I laugh in
the wrong place--I do the unnecessary, extravagant thing. Endowed
by some strange power with extraordinary attributes, I am supposed
to make everybody love me, but I don't--I satisfy nobody; I
convince none! I have no idea what will happen to me next. I am
doomed to--I know not what."

"And I," he groaned bitterly, "I, in some rare and lucid moments,
have had a glimpse of this too. We are in the hands of some
inscrutable but awful power. Tell me, Golly, tell me, darling, who
is it?"

Again that gleam of Common or Ordinary Horse Sense came in her eye.

"I have found out who," she whispered. "I have found out who has
created us, and made us as puppets in his hands."

"Is it the Almighty?" he asked.

"No; it is"--she said, with a burst of real laughter--"it is--The
'All Caine!"

"What! our countryman the Manxman? The only great Novelist? The
beloved of Gladstone?" he gasped.