“Sometimes. What are you implying? What are you trying to get at? Whatever it is, you are wrong. I was in her confidence, she liked talking to me. I did her good.” “With drugs or dogma?” I asked. “With sympathy. She had suffered terribly, more than any woman should be allowed to suffer. And she was ultra-sensitive, her nerves were all exposed, inflamed. You have sometimes that elusive, strange resemblance to her. But she had neither strength nor courage and as for hardness ... she did not know the meaning of the word.” “You are wrong. Last night I heard her talk to Gabriel Stanton.” “Did you?” His eyes lightened. “Tell me. But he was not the man for her, never the man for her. Not sufficiently flexible. He took her too seriously.” “Can a man take a woman too seriously?” “An emotional, nervous, delicate woman. Yes. You’ve been through all the letters?” “No. There are a few more.” They were on the table, and I put my hand on them. I was sure that no one but I must see them. “The first two or three times that Gabriel Stanton came down he stayed at ‘The King’s Arms.’ She was always ill after he left, always. She made a brave effort, poor girl. Day after day I have come in and seen her sitting as you are, paper before her, and ink. I don’t think anything ever came of it. She would play too, for hours.” “You stayed away when he was here, I suppose?” “No! Not always. I was sent for once or twice. She had those heart attacks.” “Hysteria?” “Heart attacks. He did not know how to treat or calm her.” “Poor Gabriel Stanton!” “Poor Margaret Capel!” he retorted. “I wouldn’t try to write the story if I were you. You misjudge her, I am sure you do. She was delicate-minded.” “Why did she have him down here at all? She knew the risk she ran. Why did she not wait until the decree _was_ made absolute?” For by now, of course, I knew how the trouble came about. “She was in love with him.” “She did not know the meaning of the word. She was philandering with you at the time.” He grew red. “She was not. I was her doctor.” “And are not doctors men?” “Not with their patients.” I looked at him thoughtfully and remembered Ella. He answered as if he read my thoughts. “You are not my patient, you are Lansdowne’s.” He gave a short uncertain laugh when he had said that. That seemed amusing to me, for I did not care whether he was a man or not, feeling ill and superlatively old and sexless, also that he lacked something, had played this game with Margaret, the game she had taught him, until his withers were all unwrung, until she had bereft him of reason, leaving him empty, as it were hollow, filled up with words, meaningless words that were part of the fine game, of which he had forgotten or never known the rules. After he left I read her next letter, the one written after Gabriel Stanton had been to Pineland for the first time, and she had told him how she felt about him. Carbies, Pineland.