elderly man who is tremendously rich, whose name you would recognize if I
mentioned it, gave me an order. For weeks, nearly every day, he came to
my studio for tea, to talk over the plans. I was really unsophisticated
then--but I can see now--well, that the garden was a secondary
consideration . . . . And the fact that I did it for him gave me a
standing I should not otherwise have had . . . . Oh, it is sickening
to look back upon, to think what an idiot I was in how little I saw....

"That garden launched me, and I began to have more work than I could do.
I was conscientious about it tried--tried to make every garden better
than the last. But I was a young woman, unconventionally living alone,
and by degrees the handicap of my sex was brought home to me. I did not
feel the pressure at first, and then--I am ashamed to say--it had in it
an element of excitement, a sense of power. The poison was at work. I
was amused. I thought I could carry it through, that the world had
advanced sufficiently for a woman to do anything if she only had the
courage. And I believed I possessed a true broadness of view, and could
impress it, so far as I was concerned, on others . . . .

"As I look back upon it all, I believe my reputation for coldness saved
me, yet it was that very reputation which increased the pressure, and
sometimes I was fairly driven into a corner. It seemed to madden some
men--and the disillusionments began to come. Of course it was my fault
--I don't pretend to say it wasn't. There were many whom, instinctively,
I was on my guard against, but some I thought really nice, whom I
trusted, revealed a side I had not suspected. That was the terrible
thing! And yet I held to my ideal, tattered as it was. . . "

Alison was silent a moment, still clinging to his hand, and when she
spoke again it was with a tremor of agitation.