better leave me. This isn't a nice place for you."

"It isn't a very nice place for anybody. You've let your fire go out.
Come upstairs and get warm; we haven't seen you for ages."

He shook his head sadly.

"I can't, Sis, I'm much too seedy."

"Nonsense! You will be, if you sit down here catching cold." She took
up her lamp, and laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Come; don't keep me waiting, or I shall catch cold too."

His will was in abeyance, and to her intense relief he got up and
followed her.

She was shocked at the change in his appearance when she saw him in the
full lamplight of the studio. He was pitifully thin; his fingers, as he
held out his hands to the blaze, were pale, even with the red glow of
the fire through them. His eyes had lost their dog-like pathos, and had
the hard look of the human animal. She got ready some strong coffee, and
made him drink it. That, with the warmth and the unaccustomed kindness,
revived him. Then she sat down in a low chair opposite him, with some
sewing in her lap, so that he might talk to her or not, as he pleased.
At first he evidently preferred to think; and when he did speak, it was
as if he were thinking aloud.

"I was cut by two men I know to-day. I wonder how many women there are
in London who would do what you've done for me to-night?"

"What have I done? I walked into your room without an invitation--I
don't suppose many women in London would have done that. But is there
any woman in London who has known you as long as I have?"

He winced perceptibly, and she remembered that there was one.

"Ah, if you really knew me, Kathy, you'd cut me dead!"

"My dear Vincent, don't talk rubbish. I do know--a good deal--and I'm
very sorry; that's all. I should be sorrier if I thought it was going to
last for ever; but I don't."

"You are too good to me; but--if you only knew!"

He sat silent, watching as she sewed. Something in his attitude reminded
her of that other evening, three months ago, when he had lain back in
that chair boasting gloriously, full of hope and the pride of life. He
appealed to her more now in his illness and degradation than he had ever
done in his splendid sanity. For he had seemed so strong; there was no
outward sign of weakness then about that long-limbed athlete.

"Vincent," she said presently, "what's become of the Pioneer-book? You
promised to read me some of it--don't you remember?"

"Yes. I shall never do anything with it now."

"Oh,