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 striking a woman a mortal blow. I know what it is to love now," she insisted sadly.

"Ruth and I have grown out of each other's life. Besides, you do not know her. Beneath her little form are caged powers you have not guessed," he replied, with a curious smile. "I groan and bellow in pain until you can hear me a mile. It is my way. She can take her place on the cold slab of a surgeon's table, feel the crash of steel through nerve and muscle and artery without a groan. I might rave, commit suicide or murder in a tempest of passion, but mark my word, she will lift her lithe figure erect and, with soft, even footstep, go her way."

He said this with a ring of tender pride, as though she were his child about whom he was boasting.

"I believe you love her still," Kate said, flushing with a look of surprise.

"You know her love could not live in the fires with which my eyes are consuming you," he said with intensity.

She lowered her gaze and glanced uneasily about as though afraid of him.

"Must the strength of manhood be forever throttled by the impulses and mistakes of youth? Great changes in society are impending. You have felt it. The whole world is trembling at their coming. Changes in the forms of marriage must come that shall give scope for our highest development. I ask you to enter with me into this new world as a comrade pioneer and priestess. We will enter into a