"You must not think of me that way any longer," she sighed. "You mustn’t neglect your work to come to see me, either." "You will never be my wife, then, Virginia?" "No, I could never be that, Luke—no, not that—never on earth." He shrank together as if in sudden, sharp physical pain, and then he rose to his full height and reached for his hat, which she had placed on the table. His heavy-soled boots creaked on the rough floor; he tipped his chair over, and it would have fallen had he not awkwardly caught it and restored it to its place. "You have a good reason, I am sure of that," he said, huskily. "Yes, yes, I—I have a reason." Her stiff lips made answer. "We are not for each other, Luke. If you’ve been thinking so, so long, as you say, it is because you were trying to make me fit your ideal, but I am not that in reality. I tell you I’m only a poor, suffering girl, full of faults and weaknesses, at times not knowing which way to turn." He had reached the door, and he stepped out into the moonlight, his massive head still bare. He shook back his heavy hair in a determined gesture of supreme faith and denial and said: "I know you better than you know yourself, because I know better than you do how to compare you to other women. I want you, Virginia, just as you are, with every sweet fault about you. I want you with a soul that actually bleeds for you, but you say it must not be, and you know best." "No, it can’t possibly be," Virginia said, almost fiercely. "It can never be while life lasts. You and I are as wide apart as the farthest ends of the earth." He bowed his head and stood silent for a moment, then he sighed as he looked at her again. "I’ve thought about life a good deal, Virginia," he said, "and I’ve almost come to the conclusion that a great tragedy must tear the soul of every person destined for spiritual growth. This may be my tragedy, Virginia; I know something of the tragedy that lifted Ann Boyd to the skies, but her neighbors don’t see it. They are still beating the material husk from which her big soul has risen." "I know what she is," Virginia declared. "I’m happy to be one who knows her as she is—the grandest woman in the world." "I’m glad to hear you say that," King said. "I knew if anybody did her justice it would be you." "If I don’t know how to sympathize with her, no one does," said the girl, with a bitterness of tone he could not fathom. "She’s wonderful; she’s glorious. It would be worth while to suffer anything to reach what she has reached." "Well, I didn’t come to talk of her, good as she has been to me," King said, gloomily. "I must get back to the grind and whir of that big building. I shall not come up again for some time. I have an idea I know what your reason is, but it would drive me crazy even to think about it."