should say so," returned Tom, changing
his tone. "It may be a painful fact, but even ladies ought to be told
the truth, and learn to bear it. To say you are not lovely would be a
downright lie."

"I wish you wouldn't talk to me about myself!" said Letty, feeling
confused and improper, but not altogether displeased that it was
possible for such a mistake to be made. "I don't want to hear about
myself. It makes me so uncomfortable! I am sure it isn't right: is it,
now, Mr. Helmer?"

As she ended, the tears rose in her eyes, partly from unanalyzed
uneasiness at the position in which she found herself and the turn the
talk had taken, partly from the discomfort of conscious disobedience.
But still she did not move.

"I am very sorry if I have vexed you," said Tom, seeing her evident
trouble. "I can't think how I've done it. I know I didn't mean to; and
I promise you not to say a word of the kind again--if I can help it.
But tell me, Letty," he went on again, changing in tone and look and
manner, and calling her by her name with such simplicity that she never
even noticed it, "do tell me what you are reading, and that will keep
me from _talking_ about you--not from--the other thing, you know."

"There!" said Letty, almost crossly, handing him her book, and pointing
to the sonnet, as she rose to go.

Tom took the book, and sprang to his feet. He had never read the poem,
for Milton had not been one of his masters. He stood devouring it. He
was doing his best to lay hold of it quickly, for there Letty stood,
with her hand held out to take the book again, ready upon its
restoration to go at once. Silent and motionless, to all appearance
unhasting, he read and reread. Letty was restless, and growing quite
impatient; but still Tom read, a smile slow-spreading from his eyes
over his face; he was taking possession of the poem, he would have
said. But the shades and kinds and degrees of possession are
innumerable; and not until we downright love a thing, can we _know_ we
understand it, or rightly call it our own; Tom only admired this one;
it was all he was capable of in regard to such at present. Had the whim
for acquainting himself with it seized him in his own study, he would
have satisfied it with a far more superficial interview; but the
presence of the girl, with those eyes fixed on him as he read--his
mind's eye saw them--was for the moment an enlargement of his being,
whose phase to himself was a consciousness of ignora