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 what I have always felt, Mr. Welles, about it. But I never seemed to be able to make you see. Now, as I say, things have come to a point. You must do something.”

“But this is absurd, Miss Gould! I am not a child, and surely nobody can dream of holding you in any way responsible—”

“I hold myself responsible,” she replied simply, “and I have never approved of it—never!”

He shrugged his shoulders desperately. She was imperturbable; she was impossible; she was beyond argument or persuasion or ridicule.

“Suppose I say that I think the situation is absurd, and that I refuse to be placed at Mr. Waters’s disposal?” he suggested with a furtive glance. She drew the ivory hook through the green meshes a little faster.

“I should be obliged to refuse to renew