“If only he could come!” she said, and she sank vaguely into the imagined solace. But what could she say to him? The formulated query crystallised her thoughts into chill dismay. How could she make known, even to him, the humiliation of that last interview with Sylvester, expose to him the nakedness of her outraged pride? She shrank from the thought. And the history of the year's follies? No. Never. She crumpled the letter fiercely in her hand. Then, suddenly repenting of her violence, she smoothed the sheet tenderly and kissed it and slipped it into the bosom of her dress. The year's follies. In this hour of lassitude and depression--rare to Ella, but common to all her sex, coming to woman with rhythmic iteration as inevitable as the tides--they rose up one by one before her, and her cheeks burned with shame. First it was Lionel Kavanagh, the poet and aesthetic critic. She had been reckless, craving excitement, forgetfulness of her burning humiliation. All through the season a year ago, she had flirted with him, openly, outrageously. He was one of Lady Milmo's menagerie, and used to sprawl on the hearth-rug and alternate rhapsody with mordant wit. And alone in her company he would sail perilously near the wind with sensuous allusiveness, until one day he grew bold and brought her a sonnet frankly sensual. She tore the manuscript into tiny pieces during an ominous silence, and ordered him out of the house. The next was Bertie Hetherington, who made violent love to her at Aix-les-Bains, whither she had been led by Lady Milmo's wandering fancy and rheumatic tendencies. He was a fresh, wholesome young Briton in a Hussar regiment. The vehemence of his devotion was sweet to Ella, and she kept him hoping longer than she knew was right. Perhaps if he had possessed more brains she might have married him. But when he wrote her an impassioned letter in which he affirmed that his heart _beet_ only for her, the spelling caught the humorous side of Ella's fancy and she laughed herself out of her entanglement. Yet she had wronged him, just as Sylvester had wronged her, and she had wronged herself. The fresh bloom of her maidenhood had gone. Her sensitive pride magnified the taint.