The front door had closed after the last guest, the butler had turned down the lights in the hall, Miss Starbruck had gone up-stairs, and Hermia was standing by the library fire. She heard some one come down the hall, and turned her head, her expression of indifference and mental fatigue lifting a little. The portière was pushed aside and Cryder entered the room. * * * * * The next morning Hermia stood gazing at her bedroom fire for a few moments before going down-stairs. Her face wore a peculiar expression. “Is there anything in love?” she murmured, half aloud. “_Is_ there?” She went down to the library and sank listlessly into a chair, and covered her face with her hands. She did not love Cryder. There was but one answer to the question now. Imagination and will had done their utmost, but had been conquered by fact. She had made a horrible mistake. She felt an impulse to fling herself on the floor and shriek aloud. But the self-control of years was stronger than impulse. In spite of the softening influences of happier conditions, she must suffer or enjoy in her old dumb way until something had smashed that iron in her nature to atoms or melted it to lava. But, if she was saturated with dull disgust and disappointment, her conscience rapped audibly on her inactive brain. It was her duty to herself and to Cryder to break the thing off at once—to continue it, in fact, was an impossibility. But she shrank from telling Cryder that he must go and not return. He loved her, not as she had wanted to be loved, perhaps, but with his heart, his sentiment. She liked him—very much indeed—and had no desire to give him pain. He might suffer the more keenly because of the fineness of his sensibilities. Suppose he should kill himself? Men so often killed themselves for women who did not love them. She remembered that she had dreamed of men dying for hopeless love of her; but, now that it seemed imminent, the romance was gone. It would be nothing but a vulgar newspaper story after all. What should she do? She must tell him. She turned to her desk, then sank back into her chair. She could not write. He would come again that evening. She would tell him then. Written words of that sort were always brutal. How she got through that day she never knew. It seemed as if the very wheels of life were clogged. The sky was gray and the snow fell heavily; the gas had to be lighted in the house. No one called; but Hermia was willing to be left to solitude. She was not restless, she was dully indifferent. The grayness of the day entered into her and enveloped her; life in the Brooklyn flat had never looked colder and barer than in this palace which her will and her wealth had created. When evening came she gave orders that no one but Cryder should be admitted. Somewhat to her surprise he did not come. She did not care particularly, but went to bed at half-past nine, and had Miss Newton rub her to sleep.