66 The Light That Failed Good-bye, darling, and bless you.” Maisie stole away like a little gray mouse. Dick watched her till she was out of sight, but he did not hear her say to herself, very soberly, “I’m a wretch, — a horrid, selfish wretch. But it’s Dick, and Dick will understand.” No one has yet explained what actually happens when an irresistible force meets the immovable post, though many have thought deeply, even as Dick thought. He tried to assure himself that Maisie would be led in a few weeks by his mere presence and discourse to a better way of thinking. Then he remembered much too distinctly her face and all that was written on it. “If I know anything of heads,” he said, “there’s everything in that face but love. I shall have to put that in myself; and that chin and mouth won’t be won for nothing. But she’s right. She knows what she wants, and she’s going to get it. What insolence! Me! Of all the people in the wide world, to use me! But then she’s Maisie. There’s no getting over that fact; and it’s good to see her again. This business must have been simmering at the back of my head for years... . She'll use me as I used Binat at Port Said. She’s quite right. It will hurt a little. I shall have to see her every Sunday, — like a young man courting a housemaid. She’s sure to come around; and yet — that mouth isn’t a yielding mouth. I shall be wanting to kiss her all the time, and I shall have to look at her pictures, — I don’t even know what sort of work she does yet, — and I shall have to talk about Art, — Woman’s Art! Therefore, particularly and perpetually, damn all varieties of Art. It did me a good turn once, and now it’s in my way. I'll go home and do some Art.” Half-way to the studio, Dick was smitten with a terrible thought. The figure of a solitary woman in the