A time came, however, when the human tree lay prone, its uprooting an accomplished fact. Its roots, bared to the sun and wind, trembled a little, but the groaning was over. Now there was nothing to do but tell Chrissalyn and go. The Butterfly paled as she heard the decision. “I have known this for a long time,” she said, “long before you knew it yourself, but I would not speak of it, lest you might be guided by what I said. I learned it by the inside way that things are told me so often. It’s hard for me to have you go; but I understand, and believe it’s for the best. Does any one else know?” “Not yet. I don’t tell others, even good friends, because they will ask questions about my plans and dig my very heart out of my body to find out all about what I am going to do. In the first place I don’t know. In the second I should not care to tell if I did. Telling spoils everything for me. Why do people make inquisitions of themselves and torture others merely to gratify an idle curiosity?” “Cartice”--Chrissalyn spoke a little cautiously--“in the face of what you have been saying, and knowing that your temper is not seraphic, I will say I wish I knew for sure that you would have something to hold on to, when you get to New York.” “Chriss, dear, I _must_ find something, that’s all there is to it. MUST. That word is a magnet drawing whatever it demands. Whenever we MUST have something, we get it.” Contact with the industrial problem had let a few practical ideas into the Butterfly’s once airy head. Therefore she was concerned about the financial future of her friend. Still, she did not comprehend the situation in its tragic entirety. A prop of some kind had ever been near for her to lean on in dire extremity. Fate provides props for those who are not strong enough to stand alone; but the great souls are placed where there is nothing to lean against, that they may both keep and show their strength. They suffer; their hearts often bleed; but they stand. Then, too, Chrissalyn looked upon her friend as a person of such incomparable ability, that she could overcome any obstacle, however formidable. “How I shall miss you, Cartice,” she said, huskily. “How lonely and bereft I shall be.” “You have your admirers, your moths.” “My moths? Yes, my miserable moths,” said Chrissalyn, contemptuously. “They are about as much comfort to me, as so many of the genuine insects. I am a proof of evolution. I have evolved too far to find them interesting. But where are the men? Do they not exist outside of novels any more? For a long time I cherished dreams of meeting one whom I could love without being ashamed of myself, but I am giving them up. Sometimes, where I hear of friends marrying, it all sounds so fine that I am quite envious until I see their husbands, and then I am better contented.”