"Your foundation," he went on, with still further loss of motive power, "would--gain nothing by bearing the name of my father. He was not worthy.... No one knows that better than you. Will you tell me what impulse put it into your mind to--to do this?" "I--had many reasons," said she, speaking with some difficulty. "I will tell you one. My father loved him once. I know he would like me to do something--to make the name honorable again." "That," he said, in a hard voice, "is beyond your power." She showed no disposition to contradict him, or even to maintain the conversation. Presently he went on:-- "I cannot let you injure your foundation by--branding it with his notoriety, in an impulsive and--and fruitless generosity. For it would be fruitless. You, of all people, must understand that the burden on the other side is--impossibly heavy. You know that, don't you?" She raised her head and looked at him. Again, her pride had been plucking at her heartstrings, burning her with the remembrance that he, when he gave her everything that a man could give, had done it in a manner perfect and without flaw. And now she, with her infinitely smaller offering, sat tongue-tied and ineffectual, unable to give with a show of the purple, too poor-spirited even to yield him the truth for his truth which alone made the gift worth the offering. Her blood, her spirit, and all her inheritance rallied at the call of her pride. She looked at him, and made her gaze be steady: though this seemed to her the hardest thing she had ever done in her life. "I must not let you think that I wanted to do this only for your father's sake. That would not be honest. Part of my pleasure in planning it--most of it, perhaps--was because I--I should so much like to do something for your father's son." She rose, trying to give the movement a casual air, and went over to her little desk, pretending to busy herself straightening out the litter of papers upon it. From this safe distance, her back toward him, she forced herself to add:-- "This reformatory will take the place of the one you--would have won for us. Don't you see? Half-my happiness in giving it is gone, unless you will lend me the name." Behind her the silence was impenetrable.