“Well,” she hesitated. “He did not really want to give me the picture. He thought he wanted to keep it himself. It was much the best thing he ever did. I had to persuade him a good deal, and in persuading him, I may have given him the impression that I cared about him more than I really did. Anyhow, after I actually had the portrait hanging in my sitting-room, I told him I thought it was better for us not to meet any more. Some men would have been flattered to think I took them so seriously. But he was furious, and one day when I was out he sent for the portrait and cut it all to pieces. Wasn’t that horrible? My pretty portrait!” “Horrible!” said Riatt. “It seems to me the one spark of spirit the poor young man showed.” She glanced at him under her lashes. “What would you have done?” “I’d take you out to the plains for a year or so, and let you find out a little about what life is like.” “I don’t think it would be a success,” she returned. “I don’t profit by discipline, I’m afraid. But,” she stood up, “I’m perfectly open minded. I’ll make a beginning. I’ll wash the dishes--just to please you.” [Illustration: And then, with a clean towel, he deliberately dried her hands, finger by finger] He watched her go to the kitchen sink, and pour water from the steaming kettle into a dish pan, saw her turn up her lace-frilled cuffs, and begin with her long, slim, inefficient hands to take up the dirty plates. Suddenly, much to his surprise, he found he couldn’t bear it, couldn’t bear to see the lace fall down again and again, and her obvious shrinking from the task. He crossed the room and took the plates from her, and then with a clean towel, he deliberately dried her hands, finger by finger, while she stood by like a docile child, looking up at him in wonder. “Don’t you want to reform me?” she asked plaintively. “No,” he answered shortly. “Why not?” “Because you would be too dangerous,” he returned. “Now you have every charm except goodness. If you turned good and gentle you’d be supreme.” “I never thought goodness was a _charm_,” she objected. “And that’s just what I hope you will never find out.” She laughed. “I don’t believe there’s much danger,” she said. “I think I shall go on being wicked and mercenary and selfish to the day of my death, and probably getting everything I want.” “I hope not. I mean I hope you won’t get what you want.” “Oh, why are you so unkind?” “Because I shall want to use you as a terrible example to my grandchildren.” “Do you think you will remember me as long as that?” “I feel no doubt about it.” She smiled. “It seems rather hard that I have to come to a bad end just to oblige your horrid little grandchildren,” she said. “As a matter of fact, I shall probably run them down in my motor as they go to work with their little dinner-pails. And as I take their mangled forms to the hospital, I’ll murmur: ‘Riatt, Riatt, I think I once knew a half-hearted reformer of that name.’”