"Did it never occur to you," said Sylvester impatiently, "that she was not half-grown-up, two years ago, and that now she may see that you are not the kind of person to suit her?" "I never could have outgrown her," said Lucian. "And did you never think that she has never forgiven us--you--for misjudging her?" "That is a different thing. That is not how it is," said Lucian, positively; then, standing up, "I want to get back to your rooms, Syl. I can't stand anything more. I'll go to bed, I feel done for." There was something pathetic in the faithfulness that could not imagine the possibility of change in the love that had once been proved worthy; but naturally Lucian's self-confidence struck Sylvester forcibly, and as they walked away together once more, he suddenly lost the remains of his patience, and broke out-- "Can't you see that a creature like that has a thousand needs and possibilities that have developed in her since she belonged to you? It may be for good, or it may be for evil, but she cannot go back. Did it never strike you _then_ that you had got hold of a being all force and fire, a splendid goddess, altogether out of your ken?" "No," said Lucian, "I meant to take care of her, and I hoped we should go on, and lead the right sort of lives together." "Well, we are each shut up in the bounds of our own nature," said Sylvester, shortly. "I think," said Lucian, after a pause, "that you are trying to make me see that I never was good enough for her." "Who could be?" "If it has been all my fault," said Lucian, in a shaken voice, "it is a hard thing to know. For--it is not all right with her now. Good-night, Syl,"--for by this time they had reached the lodgings--"I'm going to bed. You think I'm not enough of a fellow for her, but she has all there is of me, and it's no good to her." He hurried away, and shut himself into his room. His words hardly did him justice; for his thoughts were crude and one-sided; but the entire trust in the word once given, the love that had survived even the loss of faith, were feelings of heroic size. Lucian really had few faults, and such as he had, he guarded against with dutiful, if somewhat formal, technical conscientiousness. Defects of nature, as distinct from acts of sin, he did not recognise. When he found that he had been led to misjudge Amethyst, his conscience, as well as his heart, was shocked, he felt that he ought not to have been deceived, and, whether he could understand it or no, he knew that she was lost to him for ever. She was not for him. He saw too that she _was_ changed. She was not what he had expected to find her. He was bewildered by her, and he had to live without her.