l do with my sketch of
Miss Maybough."

Cornelia blenched, for no reason that she could think of; she could not
gasp out the "Yes" that she tried to utter.

"You see," he went on, "I know that I've disappointed Mrs. Maybough,
and I'd like to make her some sort of reparation, but I can't offer her
the sketch instead of the portrait; if she liked it she would want to
pay for it, and I can't take money for it. So I've thought of giving
the sketch to Miss Maybough."

He looked at Cornelia, now, for the advice he had asked, but she did
not speak, and he had to say: "But I don't know whether she likes it or
not. Do you know whether she does? Has she ever spoken of it to you? Of
course she's said civil things to me about it. I beg your pardon! I
suppose you don't care to tell, and I had no right to inquire."

"Oh, yes; yes."

"Well?"

"I know she likes it; she must."

"But she hasn't said so?"

"Not--exactly."

"Then what makes you think she does?"

"I don't know. Any one would. It's very beautiful." Cornelia spoke very
dryly, very coldly.

"But is it a likeness? Is it she? Her character? What do _you_ think of
it yourself?"

"I don't know as I can say----"

"Ah, I see you don't like it!" said Ludlow, with an air of
disappointment. "And yet I aimed at pleasing you in it."

"At pleasing _me_?" she murmured thickly back.

"Yes, you. I tried to see her as you do; to do her justice, and if it
is overdone, or flattered, or idealized, it is because I've been
working toward your notion----"

"Oh!" said Cornelia, and then, to the great amazement of herself as
well as Ludlow, she began to laugh, and she laughed on, with her face
in her handkerchief. When she took her handkerchief down, her eyes
looked strange, but she asked, with a sort of radiance, "And did you
think I thought Charmian was really like that?"

"Why, I didn't know---- You've been very severe with me when I've
suggested she wasn't. At first, when I wanted to do her as Humbug, you
wouldn't stand it, and now, when I've done her as Mystery, you laugh."

Cornelia pressed her handkerchief to her shining eyes, and laughed a
little more. "That is because she isn't either. Can't you understand?"

"I could understand her being both, I think. Don't you think she's a
little of both?"

"I told you," said Cornelia gravely, "that I didn't like to talk
Charmian over."

"That was a good while ago. I didn't know but you might, by this time."

"Why?" she ask