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 tory Louise's "you and I" might be meant to cover. "No," she assented, "yet there's something to be said for not giving people unnecessary topics for gossip, especially now that the Eveleys are on exhibition. It would be a pity if your generosity were to be misinterpreted."

Louise snapped the cover of her bag and sat on a chair facing Miriam. Her face had become serious. "Miriam, dear, are you sure you know why you are so agitated about my attentions to Dare?"

Miriam bit her lip. Had Louise guessed that her appeal was in the nature of a final effort to make Louise intervene between herself and the tyrant which had been inciting her to snatch at any fact or appearance favoring the disloyal cause? "Whatever the cause of my agitation, as you call it, I hope you won't dismiss my caution as mere meddlesomeness."

Louise got up and came to place her hands over Miriam's knees, with an impulsive yet earnest directness. "Our lives are fearfully unstable, dear. We're constantly raising little edifices in ourselves which we think are solid; then along comes some trickle of feeling and washes the edifice away, leaving only a heap of sand. The problem is to find materials within us more reliable than sand, impervious to chance streams of feeling, with which we can reinforce our edifices, so that they will see us through a lifetime . . . Only after a series of washouts do we recognize the necessity of using a durable mortar.mortar, [sic]