he had a secret together; "I'll come some other time," and he took
himself very quickly away, much to Marcia's relief. But the trouble did
not go out of her eyes as she saw him turn the corner. Instead she went in
and stood at the dining room window a long time looking out on the Heaths'
hollyhocks beaming in the sun behind the picket fence, and wondered what
he could have meant, and why he smiled in that hateful way. She decided
she did not like him, and she hoped he would never come. She did not think
she would care to hear him play. There was something about him that
reminded her of Captain Leavenworth, and now that she saw it in him she
would dislike to have him about.

With a sigh she turned to the getting of a dinner which she feared would
not be eaten. Nevertheless, she put more dainty thought in it than usual,
and when it was done and steaming upon the table she went gently up and
tapped on David's door. A voice hoarse with emotion and weariness
answered. Marcia scarcely heard the first time.

"Dinner is ready. Isn't your head any better,--David?" There was caressing
in his name. It wrung David's heart. Oh, if it were but Kate, his Kate,
his little bride that were calling him, how his heart would leap with joy!
How his headache would disappear and he would be with her in an instant.

For Kate's letter had had its desired effect. All her wrongdoings, her
crowning outrage of his noble intentions, had been forgotten in the one
little plaintive appeal she had managed to breathe in a minor wail
throughout that treacherous letter, treacherous alike to her husband and
to her lover. Just as Kate had always been able to do with every one about
her, she had blinded him to her faults, and managed to put herself in the
light of an abused, troubled maiden, who was in a predicament through no
fault of her own, and sat in sorrow and a baby-innocence that was
bewilderingly sweet.

There had been times when David's anger had been hot enough to waft away
this filmy mist of fancies that Kate had woven about herself and let him
see the true Kate as she really was. At such times David would confess
that she must be wholly heartless. That bright as she was it was
impossible for her to have been so easily persuaded into running away with
a man she did not love. He had never found it so easy to persuade her
against her will. Did she love him? Had she truly loved him, and was she
suffering now? His very soul writhed in agony to think