she dropped the hand she bad taken the instant before,
and said, disappointedly:

"I find, then, my philosophy is totally at fault."

"Wherein, Matilda?" anxiously asked Gerald.

"In this, that I have not been able to make you a convert
to my opinions."

"And these are--?" again questioned Gerald, his every
pulse throbbing with intense emotion.

"Not to pronounce too harshly on the conduct of others,
seeing that we ourselves may stand in much need of lenity
of judgment. There might have existed motives for the
action of him whom you designate as an assassin, quite
as powerful as those which led to YOUR interference, and
quite as easily justified to himself."

"But, dearest Matilda--"

"Nay, I have done--I close at once my argument and my
philosophy. The humour is past, and I shall no longer
attempt to make the worse appear the better cause. I dare
say you thought me in earnest," she added, with slight
sarcasm, "but a philosophical disquisition between two
lovers on the eve of parting for ever, was too novel and
piquant a seduction to be resisted."