It seemed to him all at once that they had little in common. She was wrapped completely in the web of her own desires; she would make her prejudices a law for him. Above all, she could not respond to the exultation of his success. She had no conception of the pride of accomplishment that is the wine of every true man's life. He had waged a bitter fight that had sapped his very soul, he had made and won the struggle that a man makes once in a lifetime, and now, just when he had proved himself strong and fair in the sight of his fellows, she asked him to forego it all. Engrossed in her own egoism, she required of him a greater sacrifice than any he had made. Now that he had shown his strength, she wanted to load him down with golden fetters--to make him a dependent. Was it because she feared another girl? She had tried to help him, he knew--in her way--and the thought of it touched him. That was like the Mildred he had always known--to act fearlessly, heedless of what her father might do or say. Somehow he had never felt more convinced of the sincerity of her love, but he found himself thinking of it as of something of the past. After all, what she had done had been little, considering her power. She had given carelessly, out of her abundance, while Cherry--He saw it all now, and a sudden sense of loyalty and devotion to the girl who had really shared his struggles swept over him in a warm tide. It was most unlike his distant worship of Mildred. She had been his dream, but the other was bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. For a long time the two sat talking while these thoughts took gradual form in the young man's mind, and although the deck was deserted, Miss Wayland had no need now to curb her once headstrong wooer. He could not put into words the change that was working in him; but she saw it, and, grasping its meaning at last, she began to battle like a mother for her child. His awakening had been slow, and hers was even slower; but once she found her power over him waning, her sense of loss grew and grew as he failed to answer to her half-spoken appeal.