i

Patricia made some important discoveries about herself within the next twelve hours. She was sleepless, and her brain was active. She found that all love-stories were entirely wrong, that they were too simple and too prudish. They did not represent her own feelings at all. And the more she tried to discover what her own feelings were, the more bewildered she became. Like so many other matters connected with herself, as to which she had no standards of comparison, her feelings seemed to Patricia to be unique. She was both ashamed and exultant at this.

At first she was too frantically troubled at the position in which she found herself to be anything but exclamatory. Within an amazingly short time she had allowed three men to make love to her, if with certain restrictions; and her sense of purity was horrified at this. There immediately followed, by reaction, some vehement attempts to justify her own conduct. But when she had been hysterical for a little while Patricia became calmer. The calm was even more false than the hysteria. It was in fact a feature of advanced hysteria. She was not equal to the strain which the events of the last few days had created.

"I don't love any of them," she said. "I'm too selfish—too wicked. I don't deserve to be loved. And I'm not loved, either. I wanted Harry to adore me. He couldn't! I want Monty ... he fascinates me. He excites me. I like it, and hate myself for liking it. He's passionate; he's sensual. And I'm passionate; I'm sensual. It's the wicked side of me coming out. And I only want Edgar to respect me. Respect!" She gave a hollow little mocking laugh. "He doesn't know me. He doesn't care for me. He couldn't adore me, because he despises me. He couldn't be passionate about me, because he's too cold. He's cold, I tell you. He doesn't know what it is to want somebody fiercely. I've got no power over him at all. And I must have power! I must!"