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 at any other time, but her absorption in her "case" blinded her for the moment.

"Friends!" she answered, with an expressive shrug; "friends—what do you call friends? I've known her for years—granted. She uses me—and thinks I don't know it. So she chooses to call me her darling, and assumes that my attitude is one of adoration. It is not; I have told her so frequently. She amuses me. In return for my usefulness, she gives me a certain cynical satisfaction, an intellectual treat. She is a great actress of parlor comedy, worthy of the closest observation. If I were on the stage I would give years to the study of her method; it is pure, unalloyed, instinctive genius."

Every word of Victoria's speech carried with it her own condemnation to Morton's ears. It hurt him, stabbed him, tortured the fine affection that he had held so long. He longed to declare his position and champion his lady's cause, but his promise held him dumb. He stared unseeing at the bare winter landscape before him. A short hour before it had not seemed unbeautiful, the pale blue sky, the gray lace-work of bare 179