Fulvia turned on the gas jet over the dressing-table and pulled out a supply of hairpins, letting down her hair. It rippled over her shoulders, reaching her waist, and sparkling where the light touched it. Fulvia stood gazing at her own reflection with folded arms, bare below the elbows. "No; I am not beautiful—not even pretty," she murmured. "But is Ethel?" Another pause, during which she gazed steadily. "So that is to be it—after all these years! I would have done anything—given anything—for him. Forty thousand!—That is nothing where one loves. He did not know why I was glad to hear that it was so much—for his sake, not mine. Little thinking then—and only a minute later—But Ethel has nothing to give him. She can mend his glove—laugh at him, perhaps, as I have heard her do. I could not laugh at Nigel—" forgetting that she had just done so. "At anybody else—not Nigel. Will Ethel understand him? Does anybody fully—except—? Oh, I think I could have made him happy!" Then the consciousness swept over her of what she was saying, of what she was allowing to herself, and with it came a rush of angry blood, suffusing her whole face. She turned sharply away, and walked to and fro, her hands locked together. "Shame! Nonsense! Rubbish! That I should be the first to think—I!—And he, of course, has never given a thought to me! Why should he? Why should I expect it? Nigel will never marry for money! Should I like him if he could? . . . And if I have not seen, I might have seen. He and Ethel! Why, it has been so for years! He would do for her years ago what he would not do for me. I never could think why, but I know now. If I had not been infatuated, I should have seen all along. Does the madre see? Is that why she minded so much? . . . No, I don't love Ethel. I don't care for her. I don't half like her. She rubs me up the wrong way, somehow. Has it been this? . . . Poor madre! Every one will pity her, and nobody will pity me! Hush—I will not have that come up! Unwomanly!—Contemptible—to give one's love where it is not wanted." Fulvia stamped her foot. "Nobody shall ever guess my folly! Anything rather than betray myself! Nigel—how Nigel would despise me, if he knew! And how I despise myself!" She stood again before the glass, noting the flush which remained.