"She was rubbing it in, that's all. We didn't have any trouble; that isn't the point. I planned this out, as you both know, with the definite idea of asking her to marry me, and before I knew what had happened she had twisted the situation around where I was on the defensive and had made myself look so ridiculous that I wouldn't have had the nerve to propose to a colored cook. There is something in all this which I don't understand, and I must understand it. I'm average intelligent, I've had some experience in life, and if a slip of a girl like that can make me lose my confidence then there's something radically wrong. You struck it right this morning, Monty, and I tell you it hurts!" The man's humiliation was so complete that both his companions were eager to relieve him. Huntington's loyalty to his friend caused instant forgetfulness of his recent resentment. "Don't mind what I said, Connie," he urged contritely. "I had no right to speak as I did." "You had every right," Cosden insisted. "All these years you have seen the lack of this something in me, and you've overlooked it because you were my friend. This morning you had sand enough to tell me the unpleasant truth when you knew I ought to hear it. What I want to find out now is what these 'finer instincts' are, and how I am to get them." The momentary silence which followed was evidence of the difficulty his auditors found in answering his appeal. He was in such deadly earnest that it was impossible to avoid direct reply. When this mood was on him, Huntington knew that he would deal with nothing but facts. "Let me leave you and Mr. Huntington to discuss this," Edith said, rising. "Please," Cosden detained her. "We are past the point of sensitiveness. I want your advice as well as Monty's. I'm up against something I don't understand," he repeated, "and I'm looking to you two to show me up to myself." "What is the use, Connie?" Huntington expostulated. "You have gone alone all these years living your own life; why disturb yourself now over something to which you have always been blissfully indifferent?" "Can't you see that the situation has changed, Monty? It was all right until I found out that I was different from other people. This is what the boys at the Club meant when they jollied us about our friendship. I always thought I was as good as anybody, but if an experience like this can make me lose my confidence in myself then the matter is really serious. It is this confidence which has made it possible for me to accomplish what I have, and if I once lose it then my strength is gone. It's all I have, Monty,--I can see that now. I must protect it, and you must help me. You must tell me what the trouble really is; I don't care how brutally frank you are so long as you tell me."