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94 doesn't get to one point and stick there. She developes. I have the highest possible regard for her," he added; with an absence, however, of spontaneity.

"Oh!" said Cynthia.

"She had everything against her, as a girl," he went on; "her mother was a very worldly woman and she lived in a worldly set. Yet with it all Grace managed to assert her own individuality and keep her interests centred in better things."

"I see," said Cynthia. "What were the better things?"

"Oh, well, I couldn't catalogue them. I gathered from what she said that the life she was leading did not satisfy her, and—that—well, with—with different surroundings and with people—or even one person—who could understand her, she might realize her better self. It was stunted, you know, situated as she was."

"Yes, I know," said Cynthia.

"That's really all," he said. "She didn't mind marrying me, and I thought, as I could never be happy myself, I might at least try to make some one else less miserable."

"Is she pretty?" said Cynthia, at once.

"She has charm, but she is not a beautiful woman—that is, as I understand beauty. But then, beauty is not everything."

"Oh no, it isn't everything, only—it's rather nice to have about."

"I think," he said, "we ought to go up these stairs—if we want to find the mummy."

"I am not particularly anxious to see the mummy," said she; "are you?"