“Rare, yes.  Even unique,” said Mills, looking at her steadily with a smile.  “But don’t try to depreciate yourself.  You were never pretty.  You are not pretty.  You are worse.”

Her narrow eyes had a mischievous gleam.  “Do you find such sayings in your books?” she asked.

“As a matter of fact I have,” said Mills, with a little laugh, “found this one in a book.  It was a woman who said that of herself.  A woman far from common, who died some few years ago.  She was an actress.  A great artist.”

“A great! . . .  Lucky person!  She had that refuge, that garment, while I stand here with nothing to protect me from evil fame; a naked temperament for any wind to blow upon.  Yes, greatness in art is a protection.  I wonder if there would have been anything in me if I had tried?  But Henry Allegre would never let me try.  He told me that whatever I could achieve would never be good enough for what I was.  The perfection of flattery!  Was it that he thought I had not talent of any sort?  It’s possible.  He would know.  I’ve had the idea since that he was jealous.  He wasn’t jealous of mankind any more than he was afraid of thieves for his collection; but he may have been jealous of what he could see in me, of some passion that could be aroused.  But if so he never repented.  I shall never forget his last words.  He saw me standing beside his bed, defenceless, symbolic and forlorn, and all he found to say was, ‘Well, I am like that.’

I forgot myself in watching her.  I had never seen anybody speak with less play of facial muscles.  In the fullness of its life her face preserved a sort of immobility.  The words seemed to form themselves, fiery or pathetic, in the air, outside her lips.  Their design was hardly disturbed; a design of sweetness, gravity, and force as if born from the inspiration of some artist; for I had never seen anything to come up to it in nature before or since.

All this was part of the enchantment she cast over me; and I seemed to notice that Mills had the aspect of a man under a spell.  If he too was a captive then I had no reason to feel ashamed of my surrender.

“And you know,” she began again abruptly, “that I have been accustomed to all the forms of respect.”

“That’s true,” murmured Mills, as if involuntarily.

“Well, yes,” she reaffirmed.  “My instinct may have told me that my only protection was obscurity, but I didn’t know how and where to find it.  Oh, yes, I had that instinct . . .  But there were other instincts and . . .  How am I to tell you?  I didn’t know how to be on guard against myself, either.  Not a soul to speak to, or to get a warning from.  Some woman soul that would have known, in which perhaps I could have seen my own reflection.  I assure you the only woman that ever addressed me directly, and that was in writing, was . . . "

She glanced aside, saw Mr. Blunt returning from the ball and added rapidly in a lowered voice,