Who would care to have me at their houses, or to come to
mine? You know what a hazardous, chancy, short-lived thing is the
fashion of a woman. With wealth, and wit, and social charm, and
impudence, she may preserve it for some years, but when she has once
lost it she can never recover it. I am as much lost to the people who
did know me in London as though I had been buried for a century. A
man makes himself really useful, but a woman can never do that."
"All those general rules mean nothing," said Phineas. "I should try
it."
"No, Phineas. I know better than that. It would only be
disappointment. I hardly think that after all you ever did understand
when it was that I broke down utterly and marred my fortunes for
ever."
"I know the day that did it."
"When I accepted him?"
"Of course it was. I know that, and so do you. There need be no
secret between us."
"There need be no secret between us certainly,--and on my part there
shall be none. On my part there has been none."
"Nor on mine."
"There has been nothing for you to tell,--since you blurted out your
short story of love that day over the waterfall, when I tried so hard
to stop you.
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