“Why did you not see me--dine with me?” she asked. “What can the servants think?” Even in such a crisis the little things had place--habit struck its note in the presence of her tragedy. “You had the Duchess of Snowdon, and we are not precisely congenial; besides, I had much to do in the laboratory. I’m working for that new explosive of which I told you. There’s fame and fortune in it, and I’m on the way. I feel it coming”--his eyes sparkled a little. “I made it right with the servants; so don’t be apprehensive.” “I have not seen you for nearly a week. It doesn’t seem--friendly.” “Politics and science are stern masters,” he answered gaily. “They leave little time for your mistress,” she rejoined meaningly. “Who is my mistress?” “Well, I am not greatly your wife,” she replied. “I have the dregs of your life. I help you--I am allowed to help you--so little, to share so little in the things that matter to you.” “Now, that’s imagination and misunderstanding,” he rejoined. “It has helped immensely your being such a figure in society, and entertaining so much, and being so popular, at any rate until very lately.” “I do not misunderstand,” she answered gravely. “I do not share your real life. I do not help you where your brain works, in the plans and purposes and hopes that lie behind all that you do--oh, yes, I know your ambitions and what positions you are aiming for; but there is something more than that. There is the object of it all, the pulse of it, the machinery down, down deep in your being that drives it all. Oh, I am not a child! I have some intellect, and I want--I want that we should work it out together.”