Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. III, 1889.djvu/66

 sure that you were what I thought you, that’s all.”

“I don’t think, on the whole, you have any reason to complain of ill-faith on my part. I secured you the opportunities that are so hard to find.”

“Yes, you did. We don’t owe each other anything,—that’s one comfort. I’ll just say that you needn’t have any fear I shall trouble you in future; I know that’s what you’re chiefly thinking about.”

“You misjudge me; but that can’t be helped. I wish very much it were in my power to be of use to you.”

“Thank you.”

On that last note of irony they parted. True enough, in one sense, that there remained debt on neither side. But Clara, for all the fierce ambition which had brought her life to this point, could not divest herself of a woman’s instincts. That simple fact explained various inconsistencies in her behaviour to Scawthorne since she had made herself independent of him; it explained also why this final interview became the bitterest charge her memory preserved against him.