"I dare say it is; but the fact remains. I don't know what is the matter with me. It is a barren feeling,—a longing, it may be, for something I can never obtain."
"All that is morbid," says Mona: "you should try to conquer it. It is not healthy."
"You speak like a book," says Rodney, with an unlovely laugh; "but advice seldom cures. I only know that I have learned what stagnation means. I may alter in time, of course, but just at present I feel that
'My night has no eve,
And my day has no morning.'
At home—in Sydney, I mean—the life was different. It was free, unfettered, and in a degree lawless. It suited me better."
"Then why don't you go back?" suggests Mona, simply.
"Because I have work to do here," retorts he, grimly. "Yet ever since I first set foot on this soil, contentment has gone from me. Abroad a man lives, here he exists. There, he carries his life in his hand, and trusts to his revolver rather than to the most learned of counsels, but here all is on another footing."
"It is to be regretted you cannot like England, as you have made up your mind to live in it; and yet I think——" She pauses.
"Yes—you think; go on," says Rodney, gazing at her attentively.
"Well, then, I think it is only just you should be unhappy," says Mona, with some vehemence. "Those who seek to scatter misery broadcast among their fellows should learn to taste of it themselves."