"You couldn't let that stay. Think—how it would sound!" She read the sentence aloud with exaggerated emphasis. But the next instant she was soothing his ruffled sensibilities. "How you must love to see yourself in print! I should like it of all things. To feel that one has power over other people's minds—to feel that one may help them, and make them better! Don't you see?" She met a non-comprehending glance. What Hamilton did see at that moment was Doris herself. He wondered that he had been so slow to realise her charm. Yes—she was the woman for him—with just a little shaping and manipulation. He was glad that he had spoken to Katherine. "Don't you see?" she repeated, her hazel eyes deepening. "I think—I do really think—I would rather have that power than any other. Only, of course, one would have first to understand more of life." But life in Hamilton's eyes wore a simple aspect, not in the least perplexing. He was always sure of his own standing, and he could look upon no landscape from his neighbour's position. "People seem so oddly arranged for—so queerly placed!" She forgot the printed slip in her hand, as she gazed dreamily away from him and toward the reddening west. "Born artists set to darn socks; and born musicians set to sweep crossings; and born idiots set to govern nations. People having to live with just those others who go most frightfully against the grain,—and having to do just exactly the work that they most detest and can't—really can't—ever do well. Why mayn't people always be with those that suit them—and do the things they like doing?" His slower mind followed her gyrations with difficulty. There was in him no gift of instant grip and swift response, that most valuable of assets in dealing with other minds. He could talk for an hour at a time, but always in certain grooves. He could not catch up another's line of thought, and make it for the time his own. Before he could decide what to say, she was off on a fresh tack. "I'm so glad you're going to get this paper out. It's a beginning. But you won't stop there, will you? You won't only write articles on geology and that sort of thing—will you? Not only about the bones of poor old dead people, who lived such ages and ages ago. Can't you sometimes write what would help the people who are alive now—something that will tell them how to make the best of their lives? Do you see what I mean? You don't mind my saying it? So many people seem to be all wrong—put in the wrong place, and having the wrong sort of work to do. And if you can write, couldn't you help them—say something to show them how to get right?" Her shining eyes were full upon him; and he had an uneasy consciousness that she was asking of him that which he was powerless to give. The feeling of incapacity was unwelcome; and he took refuge from it by beginning to quote in his measured tones— "'The trivial round, the common task, Will furnish all—'"