She turned her glance from Arbuthnot and Mrs. Sylvestre, whom she had been watching as she spoke, and looked up at Tredennis. She did so because he had made a rather sudden movement, and placed himself immediately before her. "Bertha," he said, "I am going away." Her Jacqueminot roses had been lying upon her lap. She picked them up before she answered him. "You have made too many calls," she said. "You are tired." "I have not made too many calls," he replied; "but I am tired. I am tired of this." "I was afraid you were," she said, and kept her eyes fixed upon the roses. "You were very fair to me," he said, "and you gave me warning. I told you I should not profit by it, and I did not. I don't know what I expected when I came here to-day, but it was not exactly this. You are too agile for me; I cannot keep up with you." "You are not modern," she said. "You must learn to adjust yourself rapidly to changes of mental attitude." "No, I am not modern," he returned; "and I am always behindhand. I do not enjoy myself when you tell me it is a fine day, and that it was colder yesterday, and will be warmer to-morrow; and I am at a loss when you analyze Mr. Arbuthnot's struggles with his vanity." "I am not serious enough," she interrupted. "You would prefer that I should be more serious." "It would avail me but little to tell you what I should prefer," he said, obstinately. "I will tell you a simple thing before I go,--all this counts for nothing." She moved slightly. "All this," she repeated, "counts for nothing." "For nothing," he repeated. "You cannot change me. I told you that. You may give me some sharp wounds,--I know you won't spare those,--and because I am only a man I shall show that I smart under them; but they will not move me otherwise. Be as frivolous as you like, mock at everything human if you choose; but don't expect me to believe you." She put the flowers to her face and held them there a second. "The one thing I should warn you against," she said, "would be against believing me. I don't make the mistake of believing myself." She put the flowers down. "You think I am trying to deceive you," she said. "There would have to be a reason for my doing it. What should you think would be the reason?" "So help me God!" he answered, "I don't know." "Neither do I," she said. Then she glanced about her over the room,--at Planefield, rather restively professing to occupy himself with a pretty girl; at Miss Varien, turned a trifle sidewise in her large chair so that her beautiful sleeve was displayed to the most perfect advantage, and her vivacious face was a little uplifted as she spoke to Richard, who leaned on the high back of her seat; at Arbuthnot, talking to Agnes Sylvestre, and plainly at no loss of words; at the lights and flowers and ornamented tables seen through the _portières_,--and then she spoke again. "I tell you," she said, "it is _this_ that is real--_this_. The other was only a kind of dream."