"He recognised, he adopted, your long friendship.

But he founded on it no selfishness." "No," said Maggie with still deeper consideration: "he counted her selfishness out almost as he counted his own." "So you may say." "Very well," Maggie went on; "if he had none of his own, he invited her, may have expected her, on her side, to have as little.

And she may only since have found that out." Mrs.Assingham looked blank.

"Since-- ?" "And he may have become aware," Maggie pursued, "that she has found it out.

That she has taken the measure, since their marriage," she explained, "of how much he had asked of her--more, say, than she had understood at the time.