s ear like that of
one in mortal pain. What held him silent? Why did he not tell her, why
did he not in some way make her comprehend, that he, delicate exclusive,
and patrician, as the people of his set thought him, had gone to this
man, had lifted him from his sorrow and despondency to courage and hope
once more; had found him work; would see that the place he strove to
fill in the world should be filled, could any help of his secure that
end. Why did the modesty which was a part of him, and the high-bred
reserve which shrank from letting his own mother know of the good deeds
his life wrought, hold him silent now?

In that silence something fell between them. What was it? But a moment,
yet in that little space it seemed to him as though continents divided
them, and seas rolled between. "Francesca!" he cried, under his
breath,--he had never before called her by her Christian
name,--"Francesca!" and stretched out his hand towards her, as a
drowning man stretches forth his hand to life.

"This room is stifling!" she said for answer; and her voice, dulled and
unnatural, seemed to his strangely confused senses as though it came
from a far distance,--"I am suffering: shall we go out to the air?"

CHAPTER VI

"_But more than loss about me clings._"

Jean Ingelow

"No! no, I am mad to think it! I must have been dreaming! what could
there have been in that talk to have such an effect as I have conjured
up? She pitied Franklin! yes, she pities every one whom she thinks
suffering or wronged. Dear little tender heart! of course it was the
room,--didn't she say she was ill? it must have been awful; the heat and
the closeness got into my head,--that's it. Bad air is as bad as whiskey
on a man's brain. What a fool I made of myself! not even answering her
questions. What did she think of me? Well."

Surrey in despair pushed away the book over which he had been bending
all the afternoon, seeing for every word Francesca, and on every page an
image of her face. "I'll smoke myself into some sort of decent quiet,
before I go up town, at least"; and taking his huge meerschaum,
settling himself sedately, began his quieting operation with appalling
energy. The soft rings, gray and delicate, taking curious and airy
shapes, floated out and filled the room; but they were not soothing
shapes, nor ministering spirits of comfort. They seemed filmy garments,
and from their midst faces beautiful, yet faint and dim, looked at him,