"Mean! The topmost height of your profession, or business, of whatever career you are in." "You are ambitious," he said. "Not for myself," she answered quickly. "I have no ambition for myself." "But perhaps the ambition to spur on another successfully? That seems to me the truest, the most legitimate ambition of the woman all men worship in their hearts." Suddenly tears started into her eyes. She was sitting opposite Malling, the tea-table between them. Now she leaned forward across it. By nature she was very sensitive, but she was not a self-conscious, woman. She was not self-conscious now. "It is much better to be selfish," she said earnestly. "That is where we women make such a fatal mistake. Instead of trusting to ourselves, of relying on ourselves, and of having a personal ambition, we seek always another in whom we may trust; we are unhappy till we rely on another; it is for another we cherish, we hug, ambition. And then, when all founders, we realize too late what I dare say every man knows." "What is that?" "That we women are fools--fools!" "For being unselfish?" "For thinking we have power when we are impotent." She made a gesture that was surely one of despair. "No one--at any rate, no woman--has power for another," she added, with almost terrible conviction. "That is all a legend, made up to please us, I suppose. We draw a sword against darkness and think we are fighting. Isn't it too absurd?" With the last words she changed her tone, trying to make it light, and she smiled. "We take everything too seriously. That's the trouble!" she said. "And men pretend we take nothing seriously." "Very often they don't understand." "Oh, please say never!" she exclaimed. "They never understand." Suddenly Malling resolved on a very bold stroke. "But I'm a man," he said, as if that obvious fact shattered her contention. "What has that got to do with it?" she said, in obvious surprise. "Because I do not understand." For a moment she was silent. He thought he read what was passing through her mind, as he knew he had read her character. She was one of those women who must be proud of their men, who love to be ruled, but only by a conqueror, who delight to sink themselves, but in power, not in impotence. And now she was confronted by the shipwreck not merely of her hopes, but also of her belief. She saw a hulk drifting at the mercy of the waves that, perhaps, would soon engulf it. But she was not only despairing, she was raging too. For she was a woman with nervous force in her, and it is force that rages in the moments of despair, seeking, perhaps unconsciously, some means of action and finding none. "Why should there not be some hope?" asked Malling, quietly. "To-morrow is Sunday. If you go to morning church at St. Joseph's, and then to evening church, you will see if there is any hope." "To evening church?" "Yes, yes." She got up. "You are going?" "I must. Forgive me!" She held out her hand. "But--"