Maggie was alone in the great drawing-room of the house at the end of the English Quay—­alone and grave.  Some people, be it noted, are gravest when alone, and they are wise, for the world has too much gravity for us to go about it with a long face, making matters worse.  Let each of us be the centre of his own gravity.  Maggie Delafield had, perhaps, that spark in the brain for which we have but an ugly word.  We call it “pluck.”  And by it we are enabled to win a losing game—­and, harder still, to lose a losing game—­without much noise or plaint.

Whatever this girl’s joys or sorrows may have been—­and pray you, madam, remember that no man ever knows his neighbor’s heart!—­she succeeded as well as any in concealing both.  There are some women who tell one just enough about themselves to prove that they can understand and sympathize.  Maggie was of these; but she told no more.

She was alone when Paul came into the room.  It was a large room, with more than one fire-place.  Maggie was reading, and she did not look round.  Paul stopped—­warming himself by the fire nearest to the door.  He was the sort of man to come into a room without any remark.

Maggie looked up for a moment, glancing at the wood fire.  She seemed to know for certain that it was Paul.

“Have you been out?” she asked.

“Yes—­calling.”

He came toward her, standing beside her with his hands clasped behind his back, looking into the fire.

“Socially,” he said, with a quiet humor, “I am not a success.”

Her book dropped upon her knees, her two hands crossed upon its pages.  She stared at the glowing logs as if his thoughts were written there.

“I do not want to give way,” he went on, “to a habit of morbid introspection, but socially I am a horrid failure.”

There was a little smile on the girl’s face, not caused by his grave humor.  It would appear that she was smiling at something beyond that—­something only visible to her own mental vision.

“Perhaps you do not try,” she suggested practically.

“Oh, yes, I do.  I try in several languages.  I have no small-talk.”

“You see,” she said gravely, “you are a large man.”

“Does that make any difference?” he asked simply.

She turned and looked at him as he towered by her side—­looked at him with a queer smile.

“Yes,” she answered, “I think so.”

For some moments they remained thus without speaking—­in a peaceful silence.  Although the room was very large, it was peaceful.  What is it, by the way, that brings peace to the atmosphere of a room, of a whole house sometimes?  It can only be something in the individuality of some person in it.  We talk glibly of the comfort of being settled—­the peacefulness, the restfulness of it.  Some people, it would appear, are always settled—­of settled convictions, settled mind, settled purpose.  Paul Howard Alexis was perhaps such a person.