"And so," said she, interrupting him gently, "you come here to Mulligan's, you deceive every one into thinking you are very poor, you make a pretence of selling peanuts and push a barrow through the streets--why?" "First, because pushing a barrow is--er--very healthy exercise." "Yes, Mr. Geoffrey?" she said in the same soft voice. "And second," he continued, wishing he could see her face, "second, because I find it--er, well--highly amusing." "Amusing!" she cried, turning suddenly, her eyes very bright and her cheeks hot and anger-flushed. "Amusing!" she repeated, "ah, yes--that's just it--it's all only a joke to you, to be done with when it grows tiresome. But my life here--our life is very real--ah, terribly real, and has been--sordid sometimes. What is only sport to you for a little while is deadly earnest to me; you are only playing at poverty, but I must live it--" "And thirdly," he continued gently, "because I love you, Hermione!" "Love me!" she repeated, shaking her head. "Ah, no, no--your world is not my world nor ever could be." "Why, then, your world shall be mine." "Yes, but for how long?" she demanded feverishly. "I wonder how long you could endure this world of mine? I have had to work and slave all my life, but you--look at your hands, so white and well-cared for--yours are not the hands of a worker!" "No, I'm afraid they're not!" he admitted a little ruefully. "Now look at mine--see my fingers all roughened by my needle." "Such busy, capable hands!" said he, drawing a pace nearer, "hands always working for others, so strong to help the distressed. I love and honour them more just because of those work-roughened fingers." As he spoke he reached out very suddenly, and clasping those slender hands, stooped and kissed them reverently. Now, glancing up, he beheld her red lips quivering while her eyes were suffused all at once, as, drooping her head, she strove to loose his hold. "Let me go!" she whispered, "I--I--ah, let me go!" "Hermione," he breathed, "oh, Hermione, how beautiful you are!" But at this she cried out almost as if he had struck her and, wrenching her hands free, covered her face. "Oh, God!--are all men the same?" "Hermione," he stammered, "Hermione--what do you mean?"