"Oh, what kind of people are we?" she exclaimed, tapping with one hand the book she held in the other. "Here I am with more money than I know what to do with; and here are you—" "With all the money I want." Her brown eyes swept me from head to foot. "That’s not true," she insisted. "When I first knew you I thought—I thought you were just experimenting—" "And how do you know I’m not?" "I know it from what you said yourself—that last time." "What did I say?"’ "That if it wasn’t trouble it was misfortune." "Oh, that!" "Yes, that. Isn’t it enough? And then I know it— Well, can’t I see?" I tried to laugh this off. "Oh, I know I’m rather seedy-looking, but then—" "You’re worse than seedy-looking; you’re—you’re—tragic—to me. Oh, I know I haven’t any right to say so; but that’s what I complain of, that’s what I rebel against, that we’ve got our conventions so stupidly organized that just because you’re a man and I’m a woman I shouldn’t be allowed to help you when I can." "You do help me, with your great sympathy." She brushed this aside. "That’s no help. It doesn’t feed and clothe you." I endeavored to smile. "That’s very plain talk, isn’t it?" "Of course it’s plain talk, because it’s a perfectly plain situation. It isn’t a new thing to me to see people who’ve been going without food. At the Settlement—" I still kept up the effort to smile. "If I’d been going without food there are a dozen places—" "Where they’d give you a meal, after they’d satisfied themselves that you hadn’t been drinking. I know all about that. But would you go? Would you rather drop dead of starvation first? And what good would it do you in the end, just one meal, or two meals, when everything else is lacking? It’s the whole thing—" "But how would you tackle that, the whole thing? It seems to me that if I can’t do it myself no one else—" "I’ll tell you as straightforwardly as you ask the question. I should give you, lend you, as much money as you wanted, so that you should have time to reorganize your life." "And suppose I couldn’t, that I spent your money and was just where I was before?" "Then my conscience would be clear." "But your conscience must be clear in any case." "It isn’t. When all you ask for is to help—" "But you can help other people—who need it more." "Oh, don’t keep that up. I _know_ what you need. I’ve told you already I’ve seen starvation before. Don’t be offended! And when it’s you, some one we’ve all known, and liked— Boyd liked you from the first." "But not from the last." "He thinks you’re—you’re strange, naturally. We all think so. I think so. But that doesn’t make any difference when you don’t get enough to eat." "And suppose I turned out to be only an adventurer?"