She burst suddenly into a peal of bitter, scornful laughter; the man stopped and looked at her angrily. "You're a bad pleader, brother Bob," she said; "you don't do the thing well at all. So this is your idea, is it? You think that as I have got rid of one who seemed all the world to me, and who seemed to take the first place in my heart--you think, because of that, you'll suggest a substitute." She stamped her foot and rapped her stick upon the ground. "No, a thousand times no! I tried with one; thought him the best there was on earth; I'll try no more. Still less should I be disposed to put in his place one who comes of such a stock as you. It's a pretty idea, brother Bob; 'pon my word, it's a fine idea! But it won't do; from this moment forward I've done with everything and every one. I thought I could find love and truth in the world; I've failed to find them, although God knows I've tried hard enough. Therefore I have the right to say that I don't believe they exist; and I _shall_ say it, and take my way through life accordingly. Now, I ask only one thing and I intend to have it; and that one thing is--to be left alone, to be troubled no more with any of you!" "But, my dear sister, be reasonable; think for a moment of----" "Think!" she echoed bitterly. "Do you imagine that I haven't thought and thought and thought until my brain reels; until all my past days, good and bad, file before my darkened eyes like a long-drawn-out procession that never ends? Is it possible for you, I wonder, to understand all that this thing means to me? Is it possible for you to know how I wander through the empty rooms of this place and hear his voice again as I heard it when he was a child? Heavens, man! do you know what it is to have set up something to worship, to have had nothing else in all your life that was quite so fine and splendid, and then to be told quite suddenly that you've been dreaming; that it never existed, that you've been cheating yourself all the time and have got to unlearn all the pretty fable you've taught yourself? And then you think I could fill his place; you imagine I could start all over again with the chance of being cheated afresh? I know now what was meant when it was written that a rich man couldn't enter into heaven; I suppose it applies equally well to a rich woman. This was my heaven, more than a paradise; and my accursed wealth has driven me out of it and closed it to me forever! If I had been poor, he might have clung to me and cared for nothing else, but the money stood in the way. Well, I ought to have known; I'm old enough to have learned my lesson before this. Now, brother Bob, let's put an end to this; go your way and I'll go mine. That's my final word."