To that degree, therefore, that Roger was in earnest, Mildred
shrank from him, and she feared that he would not--indeed, from
his antecedents could not--know how to hide his emotions. His words
had so startled her that, in her surprise and annoyance, she imagined
him in a condition of semi-ambitious and semi-amative ebullition,
and she dreaded to think what strange irruptions might ensue.
It would have been the impulse of many to make the immature youth
a source of transient amusement, but with a sensitive delicacy
she shrank from him altogether, and wished to get away as soon as
possible. Pressing upon her was the sad, practical question of a
thwarted and impoverished life--impoverished to her in the dreariest
sense--and it was intolerable that one who seemed so remote from
her sphere should come and ask that, from her bruised and empty
heart, she should give all sorts of melodramatic sentiment in
response to his crude, ambitious impulses, which were yet as blind
as the mythical god himself.

Had she seen that Roger meant friendship only when he asked for
friendship, she would not have been so prejudiced against him;
but the fact that this "great boy" was half consciously extending
his hand for a gift which now she could not bestow on the best
and greatest, since it was gone from her beyond recall, appeared
grotesque, and such a disagreeable outcome of her changed fortunes
that she was almost tempted to hate him. There are some questions
on which women scarcely reason--they only feel intensely.

Mildred, therefore, was heartily glad that Roger did not wait to
be introduced to her father, and that he kept himself aloof from
the reunited family during the evening. She also was pleased that