She was but a minister's daughter, but these are democratic days, when money builds altars whereat even the ancient houses worship. Men are made peers because they have so much money to put on the political counter, or were famous as makers of jam and vendors of good provisions. All sorts of vulgar personages crowd the royal precincts and wear a William the Conqueror air, most ridiculous to see. The old titles of birth and breeding are hardly recognised; unrecognised absolutely where women are concerned. Gabrielle looked at herself in the glass, and knew that she would have gone far in this latter-day hurly-burly they call society. She had all the gifts, youth, beauty, wit; she was found sympathetic by men and they were her slaves whenever she appeared among them. She could have built a social temple, and there would have been many worshippers. And for what had all this been put aside? For the love of a man, or for the trick of an imagined sentiment? Harry Lassett made a purely physical appeal, but she was hardly aware of the fact. Faber had said that she was drifting into the marriage, and this idea occurred to her when she sat alone in the silence of the night. The years had conspired to bring this impasse, from which there was no escape but by marriage. She believed that the opportunities of the day would not recur, or if they did recur, that she must give the same answer. He would build her temple and lay the first stone, perhaps upon the day she became Harry Lassett's wife. III John Faber himself had thought very little of this wonderful building when she had first mentioned it to him; but the idea began to obsess his mind as he returned to his hotel. To say that he was greatly impressed by Gabrielle's refusal of his offer is to express his feelings upon that matter somewhat crudely. There are women's moods which hurt a man's pride, but heal it as quickly. His early astonishment gave place anon to a warm admiration for her principles. They must be something more than mere professions, after all, and were so real that she had refused one of the biggest fortunes in the world because of them. This of itself was a considerable fact which dwelt in his mind. He had discovered few great characters in the course of his busy life, and was tempted to believe that Gabrielle Silvester was one of them.