But how was it, the very next night, when he dropped in to see Mrs. Despard, and surprised the syren, reading a letter of Miss Clarissa’s, and reading it in the strangest of moods, reading it with a pale face, and heavy, wet lashes.

She did not pretend to hide the traces of her mental disturbance. She did not condescend to take the trouble. She evidently resented his appearance as untimely, but she greeted him with indifferent composure.

“Mrs. Despard will come down, as soon as she hears that you are here,” she said, and then proceeded to fold the letter, and replace it in its envelope; and thus he saw that it bore the Pen’yllan post-mark.

What did such a whim as this mean? he asked himself, impatiently, taking in at a glance the new expression in her face, and the heaviness of her gloomy eyes. This was not one of her tricks. There was no one here to see her, and even if there had been, what end could she 81 serve by crying over a letter from Pen’yllan? What, on earth, had she been crying for? He had never seen her shed a tear before in his life. He had often thought that such a thing was impossible, she was so hard. Could it be that she was not really so hard, after all, and that those three innocent old women could reach her heart? But the next minute he laughed at the absurdity of the idea, and Lisbeth, chancing to raise her eyes, and coolly fixing them on his face at that moment, saw his smile.

“What is the matter?” she asked.

A demon took possession of him at once. What if he should tell her, and see how she would answer? They knew each other. Why should they keep up this pretense of being nothing but ordinary acquaintances, with no unpleasant little drama behind?

“I was thinking what an amusing blunder I had been on the verge of making,” he said.

She did not answer, but still kept her eyes fixed upon him.

“I was trying to account for your sadness, on the same grounds that I would account for sadness in another woman. I was almost inclined to believe that something, in your letter, had touched your heart, as it might have 82 touched Georgie Esmond’s. But I checked myself in time.”

“You checked yourself in time,” she said, slowly. “That was a good thing.”

There was a brief silence, during which he felt that, as usual, he had gained nothing by his sarcasm; and then suddenly she held out her mite of a hand, with Miss Clarissa’s letter in it, rather taking him aback.

“Would you like to read it?” she said. “Suppose you do. Aunt Clarissa is an old friend of yours. She speaks of you as affectionately as ever.”

He could not comprehend the look she wore when she said this. It was a queer, calculating look, and had a meaning of its own; but it was a riddle he could not read.

“Take it,” she said, seeing that he hesitated. “I mean what I say. I want you to read it all. It may do you good.”

So, feeling uncomfortable enough, he took it. And before he had read two pages, it had affected him just as Lisbeth had intended that it should. The worst of us must be touched by pure, unselfish goodness. Miss Clarissa’s simple, affectionate outpourings to her dear Lisbeth were somewhat pathetic in their way. She was so grateful for the tenderness of their 83 dear girl’s last letter, so sweet-tempered were her ready excuses for its rather late arrival, her kind old heart was plainly so wholly dedicated to the perfections of the dear girl in question, that by the time Anstruthers had reached the conclusion of the epistle he found himself indescribably softened in mind, though he really could not have told why. He did not think that he had softened toward Lisbeth herself, but it was true, nevertheless, that he had softened toward her, in a secretly puzzled way.

Lisbeth had risen from her seat, and was standing before him, when he handed back the letter, and she met his eyes just as she had done before.

“They are very fond of me, you see,” she said. “They even believe that I have a real affection for them. They think I am capable of it, just as Georgie Esmond does. Poor Georgie! Poor Aunt Clarissa! Poor Aunt Millicent! Poor everybody, indeed!” And she suddenly ended, and turned away from him, toward the fire.

But in a minute more she spoke again.

“I wonder if I am capable of it,” she said. “I wonder if I am.”

He could only see her side face, but something in her tone roused him to a vehement reply. 84

“God knows,” he said, “I do not. I do not understand you, and nev............