She told him, briefly; she wanted to hide that she had suffered aught, or had been in any measure coldly dealt with, and she spoke with the old force of a happier time, seeking rather to show how well it was with her that she should thus be free, and have no law save her own will, and know that none lived who could say to her, "Come hither" or "go there."
Almost she duped him, she was so brave. Not quite. His eyes had read the souls and senses of women for half a century; and none had ever deceived him. As he listened to her he knew well that under her desolation and her solitude her heart was broken—though not her courage.
But he accepted her words as she spoke them. "Perhaps you are wise to take your fate so lightly," he said to her. "But do you know that it is a horrible thing to be alone and penniless and adrift, and without a home or a friend, when one is a woman and young?"
"It is worse when one is a woman and old; but who pities it then?" she said, with the curt and caustic meaning that had first allured him in her.
"And a woman is so soon old!" he added, with as subtle a significance.
She shuddered a little; no female creature that is beautiful and vigorous and young can coldly brook to look straight at the doom of age; death is far less appalling, because death is uncertain, mystical, and may still have beauty.
"What do you intend to do with yourself?" he pursued.
"Intend! It is for the rich 'to intend,' the poor must take what chances."
She spoke calmly, leaning down on one of the cushioned benches by the hearth, resting her chin on her hand; her brown slender feet were crossed one over another, her eyelids were heavy from weakness and the warmth of the room; the soft dim light played on her tenderly; he looked at her with a musing smile.
"No beautiful woman need ever be poor," he said, slowly spreading out the delicate palms of his hands to the fire; "and you are beautiful—exceedingly."