THE patient had so far recovered that she could be propped up in bed, where she straightened out the bungling work of her inexperienced hair-dresser, and made her glorious hair a fit embellishment of her beauty. She was pale, and her cheeks had lost the roundness and her eyes the brilliancy of their wont. But she was regaining the flesh that she had lost, and the brightness of spirit that her afflictions had dimmed; and her pallor only softened and refined a beauty that likely had been somewhat too showy in health.

Something even better than that had been accomplished. It was not conceivable that her strong and rebellious spirit had been ever before brought under other than the ordinary restraints of a conventional life. She had developed the good sense to make the most of her present uncomfortable situation, and the will to bear its hardships. In the eyes of her host the superiority of her character entitled her to admiration, which he gave her simply and unconsciously, without any regard to her sex and beauty. Her acute insight had informed her of this admiration, and her spirit chafed under its character. One day she said,—

“It seems strange to me, Dr. Malbone, that you have never taken any interest in my past life.”

He looked at her quickly and curiously, and somewhat awkwardly replied,—

“I did not wish to intrude, Miss Andros.”

“Would that have been intrusion? I hadn’t thought of it.”

“You must know that I feel an interest in everything that concerns you.” He said this readily, simply, and naturally, and she wondered if he was sincere.

“Of course,” she went on, “lack of all companionship between us means mutual distrust.” This was a sharp thrust, and it found him unguarded. Then she saw that she had gone too far at the start; and this impression was confirmed when, after a pause, he remarked,—

“You and I have been strangely placed. I knew that the conventions of the best-bred people mean much to you, and I have merely respected your natural and proper regard for them. Under these circumstances it was not possible for me to make the first effort to be—friendly, if you will permit the expression.”

She smiled, but the manliness of the rebuke and its entire justice made her secretly resent it. She was determined to hold herself perfectly in hand, for a serious purpose now moved her, and she would not be balked.

“That is all in the past now,” she said. “I have learned to know you as a man of the finest sense of honor, proud, reserved, and self-sacrificing. It would not have been possible for any other sort of man to treat a woman as you have treated me. No, don’t interrupt me. There is nothing but common sense and simple justice in what I am saying, and unless you let me say it you will be harsh and cruel. After all that you have done for me, it is my right to tell you how I feel about it.”

He looked so embarrassed and miserable that she laughed outright; and the music of that rare note sounded in his heart; for it was not a cruel laugh, but merry and hearty, as one would laugh at the comical discomfiture of a friend; and as such it fulfilled its purpose.

Thus the ice that had filled the cabin was broken, in a measure, at last, and this at once eased the gloom and coldness of the wretched lives imprisoned therein.

From that beginning the convalescent drifted easily and gracefully into an account of her world of wealth and pleasure and fashion. She realized that she must first open her own life before she could expect her host to give her a view of his and of the nearer and stranger things that impinged upon her. Her voice was smooth and musical. She dwelt particularly upon the lighter and fashionable side of her life, because she believed that the tact and refinement of the man who listened so well, yet so silently, were born of such a life, and that he had deliberately withdrawn himself from it.

Matters went more smoothly after that day. But the young woman was finally forced to accept her defeat,—she had opened her own simple, vacant life, but had gained not a glimpse into his. And she realized, further, that all the advances toward a friendlier understanding had been made by her, and none by him; that his manner toward her, with all its tireless watchfulness, its endless solicitude, its total extinction of every selfish thought, its impenetrable reserve, had not changed one jot or tittle. Then a bitter resentment filled her, and she hated him and determined to torture him.

He had not been so guarded but that she had found a vulnerable spot in his mail. This was what she regarded as the silly, sentimental side of his nature. She had led him into this disclosure by a long series of adroit moves, the purpose of which he had not suspected. Assuming a profound appreciation of the softer and tenderer things of life, she had brought herself into the attitude of one who cherishes them, and thus led him into the trap. Their talk concerned love, and he opened his heart and displayed all its foolish weakness.

“Can there be anything more sacred,” he asked, warmly, “than the love of men and women? Is there anything to which trifling should be more repugnant? The man who loves one woman with all in him that makes him a man, has taken that into his soul which will be its refining and uplifting force to the end of all things with him; and, noble as that is, the love of a woman for one man who loves her surpasses it beyond all comprehension, and is the truest gleam of heavenly radiance in human lives.”

It was spared him to see the amused and contemptuous curl of lip that bespoke a world-worn heart; but he had let down his guard, and his punishment would come.

It was some days afterward that the blow fell. The convalescent was now sitting on a chair, where her ever-solicitous nurse had placed her. She was now ready to strike. She would hold up to him a mirror of himself,—a weak, sentimental, pusillanimous man. Fortunately, she could relate from an experience in her own life a tale whose ridiculous hero she judged had been just such a man as Dr. Malbone. She would be violating none of the rules of hospitality. Her host had permitted her to walk into a humiliating position, and her desire to punish him should not be denied gratification.

She had brought the talk round to the mistakes that men and women make in the bestowal of their affection, and remarked carelessly that men were proverbially stupid in estimating the loveliness of women. Almost without exception, she declared, they preferred girls for their beauty, their softness, their negative qualities, their genuine or pretended helplessness; and she added that a woman of strength and true worth would scorn a love so cheaply won and held in so light esteem by its bestowers.

“But some girls,” she added, “are even worse than men. You may generally expect stupidity from a man, but not always folly from a girl. A rather distressing case of a girl’s folly once came to my notice. There was a girl who had been my classmate in school. It was there that we formed for each other the girlish affection which all girls must have at that age. Yet the difference between us was great even then, and it increased after we had gone out into the world. She and I moved in the same circle. Her parents were wealthy, and she had every opportunity to see and learn life and get something of value from it. Instead of that, she grew more and more retired, and less fitted for the life to which she belonged. She was the most unpractical and romantic girl that ever lived. Her girl friends dropped her one by one. I was the last to remain, and I did all I could to get some worldly sense into her soft and foolish head. She would only smile, and put her arms round me, and declare that she knew she was foolish, but that she couldn’t help it.

“She was very fond of music and poetry, and at last I learned that she was taking lessons on the violin from some fiddling nobody who made his living by playing and teaching. I never happened to see him, or I might have done something to stop the mischief that was brewing. Her parents were blind to her folly, but that is a common weakness of parents.

“There never had been any great exchange of confidences between Ada and me since our school-days. I could have told her a great deal about the ways of men,—you see,” the narrator hastened to add, “I had been a very good observer, and had learned some things that it is to the advantage of every girl to know. I mean, you understand, about love. It is only people with a silly view of that subject that ever get into trouble. Girls of Ada’s disposition have no sense; they invariably suffer through lack of perception and strength.

“Although I did not see much of her, it at last became evident that something serious was the matter. Her manner became softer and gentler, her sympathies were keener, and there was a light in her eyes that an observing woman cannot misunderstand. I was somewhat older than she, and that gave me an advantage in the plan that I decided upon; but of greater advantage was her reliance upon me. It was necessary that I should gain her full confidence, as I didn’t wish to take any step in the dark, nor one that might have proved useless. You will understand that in all I afterward did and caused to be done I acted solely from a regard for her welfare. I believed that she had formed an attachment for this—this fiddler—bah! Everything in me revolts when I think of it. Here was a girl that was pretty, sweet, gracious, the soul of trust and fidelity, ready to throw herself away upon an unspeakable fiddler! And there was no excuse whatever for it. A score of men adored her,—men of her own station in life,—men of wealth, men of culture, men of strength and character, men of birth, men of consequence in the world. Incredible as it may seem, they passed over other girls far more capable in every way, and sighed for this shy violet.

“I knew that there was something wrong in her refusal to accept the attentions of any of them. I knew that her inherited tastes, the examples all around her, and her natural regard for the wishes of her parents and friends, ought to have induced her to give her affections to a man worthy of her. I determined to find out what that obstacle was; and it was solely for her own good that I did so. I knew that if she married this—this low musician, her life would be filled with bitterness, disappointment, and regrets. I knew that she would soon come to be ashamed of the alliance. I knew——”

“How did you know all that?” came in a voice so strange, so constrained, so distant, that she turned in wonder toward her host. He sat looking into the fire, the ruddy glow of which concealed the death-like pallor that during the last few minutes had been deepening in his face.

“How did I know it?” she responded in surprise. “That is a singular question from one who ought to be as well aware of it as I.”

He made no reply, and she turned her head to the window and watched the snow steadily rebuilding the bank that her host had so recently cleared away.

“Perhaps,” she remarked, with a slight sneer, “you asked that question to get an argument with me, for I have heard you express romantic and sentimental views on the subject of love. But of one thing I am confident: I know that you have been a man of the world, and that you understand life and human nature; and I know that while men like to assume a sentimental attitude toward love, it is merely a pose. I will not argue the matter with you. You know as well as I that such a marriage would have been a fatal mistake.”

She said this in a hard, emphatic way that indicated her desire to end the discussion. Then she resumed her story.

“I got into her confidence by professing sympathy with her, and adopting her point of view,—by anticipating it, I mean, for she was too guarded to disclose it. The poor little idiot fell into the trap. She had been carrying her secret for months, and the burden of it was wearing her out. You know, a nature of that kind must have sympathy, must have some one to listen, must have a confidant. She had not dared to trust her parents, for she knew that they would put a stop to her folly. When she found, as she thought, that I was in full sympathy with her, she laid her poor foolish heart completely open. And what do you think she was going to do?”

She turned toward her host as she asked the question, and found him still sitting immovable and looking into the fire. He seemed not to have heard her, for he made no answer; and his stony silence and stillness gave her a strange sensation that might have weighed more with her had she not been so deeply interested in her narrative, and so well satisfied with her part in its happenings. She turned her glance again toward the window, and resumed:

“She had decided to run away with this vulgar—fiddler. There was but one thing lacking,—he had not asked her; but she believed that he loved her with all his soul, and that he was having a fight with himself to decide whether it would be right for him to bring so scandalous a thing upon her. She and he both realized that it would be worse than useless for him to ask her parents for her. She said to me, ‘He fears that I shall be unhappy in the poverty that would be my lot if we should go away and marry. He fears that I should miss the luxuries to which I had been accustomed. He fears that my friends will think he had married me for my fortune. He has so many fears, and they are all for me. Yet I know that he would cheerfully lay down his life for me. There never was a man so unselfish, so generous, so ready to sacrifice himself for others.’

“I could hardly keep from laughing while the poor child was telling me all that rubbish. Before employing harsh measures to check her foolish purpose, I resorted to milder ones. While continuing to be sympathetic, I nevertheless said a great many things that would have set her thinking if she had had any sense. I gave her to understand, as delicately as possible (for I was careful not to rouse any resentfulness or stubbornness in her), that her lover undoubtedly was a worthless fellow, as persons of his class are; that he was weak in character and loose in morals; that he was merely a sly adventurer, playing adroitly upon her innocence and confidence, and anxious to leave his laborious life for one of ease at her expense. I compared her station as his wife with that as the wife of a man in her own sphere.

“The trouble was that she cared nothing for the position that she occupied. She honestly believed, poor idiot! that she could be as happy poor as rich. But the great obstacle was her infatuation for the man, and her belief that he was finer and better than the men of her own station. She was dreamy and romantic, and that is why she idealized this fiddling nobody. The more she told me of his gentleness, his refinement, his unselfishness, his poetic nature, the more I saw that he lacked the sterling qualities of manhood, the more I realized that he had made a careful study of her weaknesses and was playing upon them with all the unscrupulous skill of his species. She implored me to meet him, to know him, to study him. Of course that was out of the question. She was sure, she said, that I should come to admire and respect him as she had. I firmly declined to see him. I have even forgotten his name.”

There was a pause in the narration. The young man was so still that his guest looked round at him, and found his gaze fastened upon her. She started, for she saw that it held a veiled quality that she did not understand, and that for a moment filled her with uneasiness. He quickly and without a word looked again at the fire.