But then had come the days of Roderick's loss of interest in the scheme. He put her above the Colony, desired her above all things. She shivered back. For himself alone she could not marry him. Why, she could not tell. A girl with a mind pure and sweet does not speculate on that which, traced logically to its source, is simply elemental sexual repulsion. She clung fiercely to her point. Then Roderick returned to the scheme with his old ardour. In her heart she believed him passionately sincere. Misfortune had come with terrible unexpectedness. He had fought and failed. He was a beaten man. The dream had been brutally proved to have been the emptiest of hallucinations. She was miserably cast down. Roderick seemed broken-hearted. They were at one in an absolute cynical reality. Both had been pierced by the same shaft. The doors of the cranks' Eden had clanged behind them, and they were walking together in the grey, dreary expanse of Hyde Park, with an unknown world of the most definite prose before them. They seemed alone, to have nothing in common with the rest of society; to have in common with each other this all-filling humiliation of defeat. So when he spoke, the unreasoning woman leaped to comfort the man. She had never felt so near him. A great and natural revulsion of feeling had lifted her heart to consolation. They quitted the Park at Hyde Park Corner, and paused by common impulse. “I suppose you will take a cab now,” he said reluctantly. “I suppose I must,” she said in the same tone. “I would ask you to come with me, but it's auntie's day at home, and the place will be full of chattering people.” “I can't bear leaving you,” said he. “Nor I you.” “You look tired, poor child. Let me give you some tea. Will you? I belong to a club in Piccadilly,--the Hyde Park, where ladies are admitted to tea. It is the home of all the depressed outcasts of London, and even they shun it. We are sure to be alone in the tea-room. Come.” He hailed a hansom. Ella, in that strange mood of passivity which is woman's fatalest, entered without remark. He followed, and they drove to the Hyde Park Club. As he had prophesied, the tea-room was empty, save for one dejected member with his neck-tie riding over the back of his collar, who stared at them for a moment and then passed out like a ghost. A blazing fire, however, was burning in the grate, and the maroon leather chairs and divans added a sense of warmth and comfort to the room. The despondent ones took their seats in a little recess by the fireplace, and Roderick ordered tea. “It's a new club, and no two members are acquainted. It is the most desolate place in London. A man comes here when he wants to work out his suicide. There's no one to distract his thoughts. Then he goes out and commits it.” “Why did you join?” asked Ella, mechanically.