"I was given a life sentence for incompetency, and I've served five years of it, which have been made much happier than my deserts." "No," she persisted, "that is your way of talking of yourself; I know you would always 'run yourself down,' if one paid any attention to it.
But to give up the world, to drop out of it without regret, to come here and do what you have done, and to live the life that must be so desperately dry and dull for a man of your sort, and yet to have the kind of heart that makes wonderful melodies sing in itself--oh!" she cried, "I say that is fine!" "You do not understand," he returned, sadly, wishing, before her, to be unmercifully just to himself.

"I came here because I couldn't make a living anywhere else.

And the 'wonderful melodies'-- I have known you only one evening--and the melodies--" He rose to his feet and took a few steps toward the garden.

"Come," he said.

"Let me take you back.