I + 

Jane sat beside Flora on the little rosewood sofa in Mrs. Furness’s bedroom. They were listing the contents of the bureau drawers. That morning they had gone through the closets. Mrs. Furness’s wardrobe was heaped in four great piles on the big rosewood bed. Dresses that Flora wished to keep for herself. Dresses that her aunt Mrs. Carver might care to wear in Boston. A few darker, soberer dresses that Flora thought might be suitable for her mother’s sister in Galena. And a very few much older, shabbier ones that Flora was planning to send to the Salvation Army. It had been a very hard morning for Flora. It had been a very hard one for Jane. Jane could remember just how Mrs. Furness had looked in nearly every gown that they had examined. She could see her dancing at Flora’s début in the violet velvet. She knew just how the black lace ruff of the little silk shoulder cape had framed her white face, while Mr. Bert Lancaster was talking to Muriel in the dining-room at the coming-out tea. + 

Muriel and Mr. Bert Lancaster were still in the Canadian Rockies. Muriel had written at once to Flora. Jane had seen the letter. Muriel wasn’t much of a letter writer, but you could read between the inarticulate, straggling lines that she was really awfully sorry. Muriel wrote just the way she did when she was a little girl at Miss Milgrim’s. It made both Jane and Flora think of their school compositions to read her round childlike hand. + 

The western sun was slanting in the bedroom windows. Their task was nearly finished. Flora was keeping all the underclothes. And the jewellery, of course. She had given Jane a little gold pin, set with turquoises in the form of forget-me-nots. Jane had often seen Mrs. Furness wear it, nestling in a tulle bow on her bare shoulder. + 

The room was quite dismantled. The window curtains were down and the carpet was up and all the little ornaments were put away. Mr. Furness was going to close the house next week. He was going to take Flora around the world. They were going to be gone for a year. Mr. Furness said he might never open the brownstone house again. + 

“I’m awfully tired,” said Flora suddenly. She looked tired, and very white in the sable folds of her crisp new mourning. + 

“Go and lie down,” said Jane brightly. “We’ve almost finished. There’s just the desk.” + 

“Papa is going to do the desk, himself,” said Flora. “He told me not to touch it.” + 

“Then we’re through,” said Jane. + 

The sound of the doorbell rang through the silent house. + 

“That’s Stephen,” said Flora. “I forgot all about him. He said he would drop in on his way home from the bank for a cup of tea.” + 

“Never mind Stephen,” said Jane. “You go and rest.” + 

“Stephen’s been awfully good to us,” said Flora. + 

“He’d want you to rest,” said Jane. “I’ll go down and explain to him. I’ll give him tea.” + 

“I wish you would,” said Flora. She looked unspeakably weary. Jane kissed her pale cheek and turned toward the door. “Don’t stay in here alone,” she said, pausing on the threshold. + 

“I won’t,” said Flora. She followed Jane into the hall. + 

Jane ran lightly down the staircase. She looked a fright, she thought, after a day spent poking into shelves and boxes. Her hair was very mussy and, when she closed one eye, she could see a streak of soot on one side of her nose. She paused by the walnut hat-rack to remove it with her handkerchief. Then passed in through the drawing-room door. + 

Stephen Carver was standing at the open front window, looking out at the flowering lilacs. Their sweet, passionless perfume pervaded the room. The gold-and-green furniture was all in linen covers. The rugs were up and the crystal chandelier was swathed in a great canvas bag. It all looked very cool and clean and unlived-in. Stephen turned at the sound of her step. + 

“Hello, Jane,” he said. He looked awfully pleased. + 

“Flora’s too tired to come down,” said Jane. “We⁠—we’ve been working all day long.” + 

Stephen nodded gravely. He knew what they had been doing. + 

“Ring for tea,” said Jane. “Flora said I was to give it to you.” + 

Stephen pulled the beaded bell-rope by the white marble fireplace. Jane sat down on the linen-covered bergère. + 

“You look tired, too,” said Stephen sympathetically. + 

Stephen was nice, thought Jane. She had come to feel very near to Stephen in the last sad weeks. He had been very sweet with Flora. + 

“I am tired,” said Jane. + 

The butler brought in the tea. The big silver tea-set was down at the bank. The little china service on the old tin tray looked very strange in the Furnesses’ drawing-room. + 

“I’ll never see a china tea-set,” thought Jane suddenly, “without thinking of André’s mother.” + 

She made Stephen’s tea in silence. She was much too tired to talk. She didn’t have to talk to Stephen. She knew him awfully well. + 

Stephen didn’t seem to have much to say, himself. He sat across the swept and garnished hearth and drank his tea without uttering a word. + 

“I’m glad Flora’s going away,” said Jane presently. “It will be good for her.” + 

“You’ll be going away, yourself, soon,” said Stephen. + 

Jane’s face lit up at the thought. Her father was taking a three months’ holiday that summer. Such a thing hadn’t occurred since he had gone abroad with Jane’s mother eleven years before. They were going to make the grand tour of the West. They were going first to Yellowstone Park. Jane was thrilled over the plan. + 

“Yes,” she said simply. “It will be good for me. I’m awfully glad to go.” + 

“Are you, really?” said Stephen. He put his teacup down as he spoke. + 

“Of course,” said Jane. “I’ve never seen a mountain.” + 

There was a little pause. + 

“I hate to have you go,” said Stephen, breaking it. + 

Jane was a little surprised at just the way he said it. She looked over at him rather questioningly. Stephen was sitting, elbows on knees, his head bent to look at his clasped hands. + 

“Oh, you won’t be lonely,” said Jane lightly. “You know lots of people now. Chicago is fun in summer.” + 

“Lots of people won’t do,” said Stephen. He was still looking at his hands. Jane knew just how he felt. Very few people “did,” of course, when you came down to it. Stephen must miss his friends in Boston. Suddenly he looked up at her. + 

“No one will do⁠—but you⁠—Jane,” he said hesitatingly. “Surely, you know that.” + 

The note in his voice was suddenly very alarming. Jane felt a little frightened. Stephen stood up. He walked quickly over to the bergère and stood looking down at her. + 

“Jane,” he said, “you know how I feel about you.” + 

Jane was shrinking back into one corner of the great armchair, staring up into his suddenly ardent face. + 

“No⁠—no, I don’t,” she said defensively. + 

“I love you,” said Stephen. He said the three words very quickly, with a funny little gasp at the end. His face was flushed. + 

Jane’s hands flew up as if she could tangibly put the three words away from her. + 

“No, you don’t, Stephen!” she cried quickly. “No, you don’t!” + 

“Oh, yes, I do,” said Stephen. + 

Jane looked up at him very solemnly. Her hands dropped limply in her lap. + 

“I love you⁠—terribly,” said Stephen. “I’ve loved you from the night we first met, here in this house.” + 

“Oh, no!” said Jane again, piteously. “That⁠—that isn’t possible.” + 

“I’ve never loved anyone else,” said Stephen, “like this.” + 

“But you will!” cried Jane hopefully. “Oh, Stephen, you will!” + 

Stephen continued to look down at her, very queerly. + 

“Do you mean,” he said stiffly, at last⁠—“do you mean⁠—there’s no hope for me?” + 

Jane felt terribly overcome with a sense of helpless guilt. She⁠—she ought to have known this was coming. Clever girls did. Flora and Muriel always had. + 

“Do you mean,” said Stephen, a little hoarsely, “that you⁠—that you can’t care for me⁠—at all?” + 

Jane shook her head, very slowly. She felt dreadfully sorry for him. + 

“No⁠—I can’t,” she said simply. “Not that way.” + 

Stephen looked very much discouraged. + 

“I thought,” he said sadly, “I thought⁠—these last weeks⁠—” + 

Jane rose suddenly to her feet. She stepped right up to Stephen and took his hands in hers. + 

“Stephen,” she said, “you’ve been darling to Flora. And darling to me. I⁠—I’m terribly fond of you. But I don’t love you. I don’t love you at all.” + 

“How do you know?” asked Stephen, eagerly. He was holding her hands now, close against his breast. “How do you know⁠—if you’re terribly fond of me?” + 

“I know,” said Jane. She dropped her eyes as she felt them fill with tears. She could see the moonlit beach that minute. She could feel the shattering sense of André’s nearness. + 

“Jane⁠—” pleaded Stephen. “You can’t be sure.” + 

“I’m very sure,” said Jane. She withdrew her hands from his. + 

“I’ll never give you up,” said Stephen. Jane shuddered, faintly, at his ill-chosen words. She could feel André’s lips on hers in the dim-lit side vestibule. “You’re mine,” he’d said; “I’ll never give you up.” + 

“Don’t⁠—don’t talk like that,” said Jane sharply. She turned toward the door. “I’m going home now. You must let me go, Stephen. I⁠—I don’t want to hear you.” + 

He looked terribly sorry and just a little hurt, but Jane didn’t care. She couldn’t care for anyone now, in the sudden surge of memories that had overwhelmed her. André. André Duroy. She would never care like that for anyone again. She wasn’t even sure that she would care like that for André, now, if she could see him. But Jane knew. Jane knew all too well. + 

“I don’t love you, Stephen,” she said, with dignity, on the threshold. He just stared dumbly, despairingly, at her from the empty hearthstone. Jane turned and left the room. + 