Suddenly her passion breaks down.  Her arms fall to her sides, and she leans back against the end of her bed like a broken lily.

“Tita—­if you would let me explain,” says Rylton, who is overcome by her forlorn attitude, “I——­”

“No.”  He would have laid his hands gently upon her pretty bare shoulders, but she repulses him.  “I want no explanation; there isn’t one.”

Then, to his surprise and misery, she covers her face with both her hands and bursts into tears.

“You are unkind,” sobs she wildly.  “And you are not true.  You don’t tell the truth.  You said—­you said," passionately, “that you would be good to me.  That you would let me do as I liked—­that I should be happy!  That was why I married you!  That I might be happy!  And now—­now——­”

“But to do as you liked!  Tita, be reasonable.”

“Oh, reasonable! Uncle George used to talk to me like that. He was a reasonable person, I suppose; and so are you.  And he—­hated me!” She grows silent as one might when some dreadful thought assails one.  “Perhaps,” says the poor child, in a quick, frightened sort of way, “you hate me too.  Perhaps everyone hates me.  There are people whom everyone hates, aren’t there?”

“Are there?” asks Rylton drearily.

At this moment, at all events, he feels himself to be hateful.  What a pitiful little face he is looking at!

“Yes, my uncle detested me,” says Tita slowly, as if remembering things.  “He said I ought not to have had all that money.  That if I had not been born, he would have had it.  But one can’t help being born.  One isn’t asked about it!  If”—­she pauses, and the tears well up into her eyes again—­“if I had been asked, I should have said no, no, NO!”

“Don’t talk like that,” says Rylton.

There is a sensation of chokiness about his throat.  How young she is—­how small—­and to be already sorry that ever she was born!  What a slender little hand!  Just now it is lying crushed against her breast.  And those clear eyes.  Oh, if only he could have felt differently towards her—­if he could have loved her!  All this passes through his mind in an instant.  He is even thinking of making her some kindly speech that shall heal the present breach between them, when she makes a sudden answer to his last remark.

“If you weren’t here, I shouldn’t have to talk at all,” says she.

“True,” he returns, feeling a little discomfited.  “Well, good-night, Tita.”

“Good-night.”

She refuses to see his proffered hand.

“Of course,” says Rylton, who now feels he is in the wrong, “I am very sorry that I—­that I——­”

“Yes, so am I,” with a saucy little tilting of her chin.

“Sorry,” continues Rylton, with dignity, “that I felt it my duty to—­to——­”

“Make a fool of yourself? So am I!" says Lady Rylton.