"What is it, dear?" asked Jim, with infinite solicitude.
"Well!" Julia put the faintest shadow of a kiss on his forehead, then
got abruptly to her feet and crossed the room, as if she found his
nearness suddenly insufferable. "I can't break my engagement to you this
way, Jim," said she. "For even if I told you a thousand times that I had
stopped loving you"--a spasm of pain crossed her face, she shut her
hands tightly together over her heart--"even then you would know that I
love you with my whole soul," she said in a whisper with shut eyes. "But
you see," and Julia turned a pitiful smile upon him, "you see there's
something you don't understand, Jim! You say I have climbed up alone,
from being a tough little would-be actress, who lived over a saloon in
O'Farrell Street, to this! You say--and your aunt says--that I am wise,
wise to see what is worth having, and to work for it! But has it never
occurred to _one_ of you--" Julia's voice, which had been rising steadily,
sank to a cold, low tone. "No," she said, as if to herself, sitting down
at the table, and resting her arms upon it. "No, it has never occurred
to one of them to ask _why_ I am different--to ask just what made me so!
Life boils itself down to this, doesn't it?" she went on, staring
drearily at the shadowy corner of the room beyond her.
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