"Yes," she returned, unembarrassed. "I believe that, Frederik. In part. You loved me as much as you could love any one. But——"
"Why must there be a 'but'?" he entreated.
"But," she went on with the relentlessness of the Young, "not as much as you loved yourself."
"More! Ten thousand times more!" he declared vehemently.
"No," she contradicted. "For you didn't love me enough to give me up when you knew I cared for another man. The Perfect Love would have——"
"The 'perfect love'!" he scoffed. "I have read of it. But I have yet to see it."
"You cannot see it," she replied, "for the same reason I could not see Oom Peter when he was fighting my battle here last night. My eyes were blinded by the world I live in. Perfect love is everywhere. It is within and about us. But——"
"But I would be too ignoble to recognise it if I chanced upon it? Perhaps. But why strip me of my last illusion? In the torment of my self-abasement this morning, I have clung to that one comfort: That I love you with a love which a truly worthless man could not feel. And now——"
"Don't misunderstand me," she begged, half-tearfully. "I——"
"You have shown me the truth. And I ought to thank you for it. Perhaps some day I can. If I still remember it then. Good-bye, dear. I shan't be here again. I've—I've left you a little present. Dr. McPherson will give it to you."