"I am in love with you; that is the trouble, Mrs. Leeds. And I really have no business to say so until I amount to something." "You have no business to say so anyway after one single evening's acquaintance!" she retorted hotly. "Oh, that! If love were a matter of time and convention--like five o'clock tea!--but it isn't, you know. It isn't the brevity of our acquaintance that worries me; it's what _I_ am--and what _you_ are--and--and the long, long road I have to travel before I am worth your lightest consideration--I never was in love before. Forgive my crudeness. I'm only conscious of the--hopelessness of it all." Breathless, confused, incredulous, she sat there staring at him--listening to and watching this tall, quiet, cool young fellow who was telling her such incomprehensible things in a manner that began to fascinate her. With an effort she collected herself, shook off the almost eerie interest that was already beginning to obsess her, and stood up, flushed but composed. "Shall we not say any more about it?" she said quietly. "Because there is nothing more to say, Mr. Quarren--except--thank you for--for feeling so amiably toward me--for believing me more than I really am.... And I would like to have your friendship still, if I may----" "You have it." "Even yet?" "Why not?... It's selfish of me to say it--but I wish you--could have saved me," he said almost carelessly. "From what, Mr. Quarren? I really do not understand you." "From being what I am--the sort of man you first divined me to be." "What do you mean by 'saving' you?" she asked, coldly. "I don't know!--giving me a glimmer of hope I suppose--something to strive for." "One saves one's self," she said. He turned an altered face toward her: and she looked at him intently. "I guess you are right," he said with a short laugh. "If there is anything worth saving, one saves one's self." "I think that is true," she said.... "And--if my friendship--if you really care for it----" He met her gaze: "I honestly don't know. I've been carried off my feet by you, completely. A man, under such conditions, doesn't know anything--not even enough to hold his tongue--as you may have noticed. I am in love with you. As I am to-day, my love for you would do you no good--I don't know whether yours would do me any good--or your friendship, either. It ought to if I amounted to anything; but I don't--and I don't know." "I wish you would not speak so bitterly--please----"