think that. I can't explain unless you give me room. Thank you.
You were a beast with Miriam, not with me."

He sat stiffly on his chair and murmured, "That's just it. And now, you
see--"

"Yes, I do."

"But you don't like me."

"I might."

"You shall, by God!" He seemed to smoulder.

"I hope so," she said quietly, and damped the glow.

"You'll let me come here every night and sit with you?"

"Yes."

"And Mrs. Caniper, can she hear?"

"No, she is in the front of the house."

"And Jim won't mind?"

"Oh, no, Jim won't."

"Nor you?"

"You can get the big old chair from the schoolroom and bring it here.
That shall be yours."

He sat there for an hour, and while he smoked she was idle. His eyes
hardly left her face, but hers were for the fire, though sometimes she
looked at him, and then she saw him behind tobacco smoke, and once she
smiled.

"What's that for?" he asked.

"I was thinking of the fires on the moor--the heather burning."

"What made you think of that?"

"You--behind the smoke. If the snow comes, the fires will be put out,
but there will still be your smoke."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he said.

"I like to see you--behind the smoke."

"I'm glad you're pleased with something."

"I like a fair exchange," she said, and laughed at him, "but I shall
offer up no more prayers."

"I don't understand this joke, but I like to see you laugh." Possession
had emboldened him. "Helen, you're pretty."

"I'm sleepy. It's after ten. Good-night."

"I'll come tomorrow."

"But not on Saturday. Rupert comes home then."

"He goes on Sunday night?"

"Yes." She locked the door on him, blew out the light, and ran upstairs.
She thought Mr. Pinderwell passed her with no new sorrow on his face.
"It's worse for me," she said to him. "Jane, it's worse for me."

She went cautiously to her window and peeped through. She saw George
standing on the lawn, and tremblingly she undressed in darkness.

The next day, Mildred Caniper called Helen to her side.

"I feel--rested," she said. Her voice had for ever lost its crispness,
and she spoke with a slovenly tongue. "I don't like strangers--looking
at me. And she--she--"

"I know. She shall go. Tomorrow I'll sleep with you."

Her heart lightened a little, and through the day she thought of Mildred
Caniper's room as of a hermitage, but without the nurse the house was so
much emptier of human life that it became peopled with the thoughts of