have probably found it flat — the essence was gone, evaporated. Thus it is when we care for people. Probably — no, assuredly — there is some principle prisoned in their souls, or in the windings of their brains, which, when escaped, leaves them insipid, unprofitable and devoid of interest to us. Sometimes this essence — not necessarily the finest element in a man’s or a woman’s nature, but soul-stuff that we lack — disappears. In fact, it invariably disappears. It may be that it has been transformed in the processes of their growth; it may also be that it has utterly vanished by some inadvertence, or that we ourselves have absorbed it.”

“Then we throw them away?” Ethel asked, pale, but dry-eyed. A shudder passed through her body and she clinched her glass