She continued: "Do you remember what you said, when you read my palm, about my being willing to make an exaggerated confession of motives, rather than seem to be hypocritical, or unable to see my own faults?" He did not remember, but he dared not say so. He waited a fraction of a second too long before he said: "Certainly I remember." She looked hard at him and mentally he cowered under her clear gaze. Then her brows drew slightly together with a puzzled expression, as if she wondered why he should take the trouble to lie about so small a matter. But this passed, and she did not arraign his sincerity. "Well, what I want you to know now is that I don’t consider myself any better—than she is. Do you know what I mean? I don’t condemn her. Oh, dear, I’m so inarticulate! I hope you understand!" "I think I do," he answered, but he could not help speculating as to the definiteness of her perception. She answered his question unasked. "I get things only vaguely—that’s one reason why I could not judge a person upon the evidence of my intuition—I couldn’t tell you, for instance, exactly what happened between you two just now. I know only that I was disturbed, and that you, somehow, reassured me." "But you were more precise about what happened up-stairs." He was still at a loss to fix her limitations. "Oh, there I pieced it out a little. Shall I confess? I knew you well enough to fill in the picture. I know something of her, too." "Witch!" "You’re a wizard to make me confess!" she replied, brightly shining on him. "I don’t often speak. It’s usually very disagreeable to know so much of people—indeed, I often combat it and refuse to see. But with you it’s different." "It’s not disagreeable?" "No, it is disagreeable usually. It makes me feel priggish to mention it, too, but, with you, the impulse to speak is as strong as the revelation itself; that’s the strangest part of it." This confession gave him a new sense of power, for he saw that, sensitive as was her intuition, he controlled and appropriated it. It had already occurred to him what splendid use he might make of her, compelling such assistance as she could render. Vistas of ambition had opened to his fancy. For him, as a mere adventurer, her clairvoyance might reinforce his scheming most successfully. With her he could play his game as with a new queen on the chess-board. But he saw now how absurd was the possibility of harnessing her to such projects. He was, in fact, a little dazzled by the prospect she suggested. As he corrected that mistake with a blush for his worldly innocence, he saw what the game with her alone could be—his game transferred from the plane of chicanery to the level of an intimate friendship—or even love. He saw how she would play it, how she would hold his interest, keeping him intellectually alive with the subtlety of her character.