“I—­I’d do that again,” she said.  “It was right—­to do that—­for the good of all those men. ...  It’s not that—­but the rest—­not keeping to my bargain—­and—­Dulac.  I would have—­gone with him.”

Hilda shook her head.  “Not farther than the door,” she said.  “You couldn’t—­not after Bonbright has been such—­such an idiotic angel about you.”

“I would have—­then.”

“But you wouldn’t now?”

“I—­I can’t bear to think of him. ...”

“Um!...”  Hilda’s expressive syllable was very like her father’s.  It was her way of saying, “I see, and I’ll bet you don’t see, and I’m not surprised particularly, but you’ll be surprised when you find it out.”  It said all that—­to Hilda’s satisfaction.

“He’s been gone hours,” Ruth said, plaintively, and Hilda understood her to refer to Bonbright.

“Time he was coming back, then,” she said.

“He—­won’t come back—­ever. ...  You don’t know him the way I do.”  There was something very like jealousy in Ruth’s tone.  “He’s good—­ and gentle—­but if he makes up his mind—­If he hadn’t been that way do you think he could have-lived with me the way he has?”

“He must have loved you a heap,” Hilda said, enviously.

“He did. ...  Oh, Hilda, it wasn’t wrong to marry him for what I did. ...  I hadn’t any right to consider him—­or me.  I hadn’t, had I?”

“I don’t belong,” said Hilda.  “If I wasn’t a wicked capitalist I might agree with you—­maybe.  I’m not going to scold you for it—­ because you thought it was right, and that always makes the big difference. ...  You thought you were doing something splendid, didn’t you—­and then it fizzled.  It must have been tough—­I can get that part of it. ...  To find you’d married him and couldn’t get out of it —­and that he didn’t have any thousands of men to—­tinker with. ...  Especially when you loved Mr. Dulac.”  Hilda added the last sentence with shrewd intent.

“I don’t love him—­I don’t. ...  If you’d seen him—­and Bonbright...”

“But you did love him,” Hilda said, severely Ruth nodded dumbly.

“You’re sure Bonbright won’t come back?”

“Never,” said Ruth.

“Then you’d better go after him.”

Ruth did not answer.  She was calmer now, more capable of rational thought.  What should she do?  What was to be done with this situation?...  Her brief married life had been a nightmare with a nightmare’s climax; she could not bear a return to that.  Her husband was gone.  She was free of him, free of her dread of the day when she must face realities with him. ...  And Bonbright—­she felt certain he would not want her to run after him, that, somehow, it would lower her even farther in his eyes if she did so.  There was a certain dignity attaching to him that she dared not violate, and to run after him would violate it.  There would, of necessity, be a scene.  She would have to explain,