“When we were married,” she said, gently, “I had such a great interest in things, such a great belief in life. I had lived in politics, and I was marrying one of the coming men--everybody said you were one of the coming men--I scarcely felt there was anything left to ask for. You didn't make very ardent love,” she smiled, “but I think I had forgotten about love. I wanted nothing so much as to be like Lady Sarah--married to a great man.” She paused, then went on more hurriedly: “For a while things went right; then slowly things, went wrong. You got your--your nerves.” Loder changed his position with something of abruptness. She misconstrued the action. “Please don't think I want to be disagreeable,” she said, hastily. “I don't. I'm only trying to make you understand why--why I lost heart.” “I think I know,” Loder's voice broke in involuntarily. “Things got worse--then still worse. You found interference useless. At last you ceased to have a husband.” “Until a week ago.” She glanced up quickly. Absorbed in her own feelings, she had seen nothing extraordinary in his words. But at hers, Loder changed color. “It's the most incredible thing in the world,” she said. “It's quite incredible, and yet I can't deny it. Against all my reason, all my experience, all my inclination I seem to feel in the last week something of what I felt at first.” She stopped with an embarrassed laugh. “It seems that, as if by magic, life has been picked up where I dropped it six years ago.” Again she stopped and laughed. Loder was keenly uncomfortable, but he could think of nothing to say. “It seemed to begin that night I dined with the Fraides,” she went on. “Mr. Fraide talked so wisely and so kindly about many things. He recalled all we had hoped for in you; and--and he blamed me a little.” She paused and laid her cup aside. “He said that when people have made what they call their last effort, they should always make just one effort more. He promised that if I could once persuade you to take an interest in your work, he would do the rest. He said all that, and a thousand other kinder things--and I sat and listened. But all the time I thought of nothing but their uselessness. Before I left I promised to do my best--but my thought was still the same. It was stronger than ever when I forced myself to come up here--” She paused again, and glanced at Loder's averted head. “But I came, and then--as if by conquering myself I had compelled a reward, you seemed--you somehow seemed different. It sounds ridiculous, I know.” Her voice was half amused, half deprecating. “It wasn't a difference in your face, though I knew directly that you were free from--nerves.” Again she hesitated over the word. “It was a difference in yourself, in the things you said, more than in the way you said them.” Once more she paused and laughed a little. Loder's discomfort grew.