tired eyes--a weariness somehow enhanced--in effect by the gold sheen of
her hair--confirmed the truth of her words.

"You've changed, Ethel, since Sutcliffe," she said.

"Yes, I've changed," said Ethel Wing, and the weariness was in her voice,
too. "I've had too much, Honora. Life was all glitter, like a Christmas
tree, when I left Sutcliffe. I had no heart. I'm not at all sure that I
have one now. I've known all kinds of people--except the right kind. And
if I were to tell you some of the things that have happened to me in five
years you wouldn't believe them. Money has been at the bottom of it
all,--it ruined my brother, and it has ruined me. And then, the other
day, I beheld a man whose standards simply take no account of money, a
man who holds something else higher. I--I had been groping lately, and
then I seemed to see clear for the first time in my life. But I'm afraid
it comes too late."

Honora took her friend's hand in her own and pressed it.

"I don't know why I'm telling you all this," said Ethel: "It seems to-day
as though I had always known you, and yet we weren't particularly
intimate at school. I suppose I'm inclined to be oversuspicious. Heaven
knows I've had enough to make me so. But I always thought that you were a
little--ambitious. You'll forgive my frankness, Honora. I don't think
you're at all so, now." She glanced at Honora suddenly. "Perhaps you've
changed, too," she said.

Honora nodded.

"I think I'm changing all the time," she replied.