“I don’t admit that in a horror of cruelty, it is possible to go too far,” the Professor replied. “Cruelty is the one unpardonable sin.” He passed his hand across his brow, with a weary gesture, as if the pressure of misery and tumult and anguish in the world, were more than he could bear.
“You won’t give up your music, Hadria,” Valeria said, at the end of a long cogitation.
“It is a forlorn sort of pursuit,” Hadria answered, with a whimsical smile, “but I will do all I can.” Valeria seemed relieved.
“And you will not give up hope?”
“Hope? Of what?”
“Oh, of—of——. What an absurd question!”
Hadria smiled. “It is better to face facts, I think, than to shroud them away. After all, it is only by the rarest chance that character and conditions happen to suit each other so well that the powers can be developed. They are generally crushed. One more or less——.” Hadria gave a shrug.
The Professor broke in, abruptly.
“It is exactly the one more or less that sends the balance up or down, that decides the fate of men and nations. An individual often counts more than a generation. If that were not so, nothing would be possible, and hope would be insane.”
“Perhaps it is!” said Hadria beneath her breath.