"Good-bye, Lady Auriol," said he.

"No," she said. "There are things which we really ought to say to each other. You do believe I wish I had never come?"

"I can quite understand," said he, stiffly.

"It hurts," she said.

"Why should it matter so much?" he asked.

"I don't know--but it does."

He drew himself up and his face grew stern.

"I don't cease to be an honourable man because of my profession; or to be worthy of respect because I am loyal to sacred obligations."

"You put me in the wrong," she said. "And I deserve it. But it all hurts. It hurts dreadfully. Can't you see? The awful pity of it? You of all men to be condemned to a fife like this. And you suffer too. It all hurts."

"Remember," said he, "it was the life to which I was bred."