“For a long time I taught school,” she went on, “but I couldn’t save enough that way. I never could have saved enough, even if I had lived on bread and water. I wanted—I needed a great deal of money, and I wasn’t clever nor particularly well educated. Sometimes I thought if I could only marry a millionaire—” He stared at her incredulously. “You don’t mean that,” he said with some impatience. She sighed. “I’m telling you just what happened,” she reminded him. “It seemed the only way to get what I wanted. I thought I shouldn’t mind that, or—anything, if I could only have as much money as I needed.” A sense of sudden violent anger flared up within him. Did the girl realize what she was saying? She glanced up at him. “I never meant to tell any one about that part of it,” she said hurriedly. “And—it wasn’t necessary, after all; I got the money another way.” He bit off the point of a pencil he had been sharpening with laborious care. “I should probably never have had a chance to marry a millionaire,” she concluded reminiscently. “I’m not beautiful enough.” With what abominable clearness she understood the game: the marriage-market; the buyer and the price. “I—didn’t suppose you were like that,” he muttered, after what seemed a long silence. She seemed faintly surprised. “Of course you don’t know me,” she said quickly. “Does any man know any woman, I wonder?” “They think they do,” he stated doggedly; “and that amounts to the same thing.” His thoughts reverted for an uncomfortable instant to Wesley Elliot and Fanny. It was only too easy to see through Fanny. “Most of them are simple souls, and thank heaven for it!” His tone was fervently censorious. She smiled understandingly. “Perhaps I ought to tell you further that a rich man—not a millionaire; but rich enough—actually did ask me to marry him, and I refused.” “H’mph!” “But,” she added calmly, “I think I should have married him, if I had not had money left me first—before he asked me, I mean. I knew all along that what I had determined to do, I could do best alone.” He stared at her from under gathered brows. He still felt that curious mixture of shame and anger burning hotly within. “Just why are you telling me all this?” he demanded roughly. She returned his look quietly. “Because,” she said, “you have been trying to guess my secret for a long time and you have succeeded; haven’t you?” He was speechless.