eyes for pity at the thought of the pain she must give
him. Yet she had put on her new close-fitting coat and
a becoming fur cap, and pulled out the loose hair which
she knew at this moment was blowing about her pink cheeks
in curly wisps in a way that was perfectly maddening.
Clara, seeing the mischief in her eyes as she listened
shyly to Perry, went on satisfied. There was no
abyss of black loss in that girl's life!

Lucy just now was concerned only for Perry. How the poor
man loved her! Why not marry him after all, and put him
out of his pain? She was twenty-four. Most women at
twenty-four had gone through their little tragedy of
love. But she had had no tragedy. She told herself
firmly that there had been no story of love in her life.
There never could be, now. She was too old.

She was tired, too, and very lonely. This man would seat
her on a throne and worship her every day. That would be
pleasant enough.

"I am ashamed of myself," he was saying, "to pursue you
in this way. You have given me no encouragement, I know.
But whenever I go to New York and bone down to work,
something tells me to come back and try again."

Lucy did not answer, and there was a brief silence.

"Of course I'm a fool,"--prodding the ground with his
stick. "But if a man were in a jail cell and knew that