"Clarice says the way you've taken care of Ellen----" "And the way Ellen has taken care of me--but then Ellen was all the woman I had." He caught himself up swiftly after that; it was seldom even to his partner that anything escaped him in reference to the interior life of dreams which had gone on in him, quite happily behind his undistinguished exterior.

"But somehow it hasn't seemed to come out anywhere.

I've done my duty ...

and when I'm dead and Ellen's dead, where is it?
After all, what have I done ?" "Ah, look at Pleasanton," Julian reminded him; "do you call that nothing ?" They looked together toward the esplanade along the river, beginning at this hour to be flecked with the white aprons of nurse-maids and their charges.

"We've given them clean water to drink and clean streets, and a safe place for the children to play in.