higher
ground he looked down at her curiously, for in more than one sense she
was a puzzle to him. There was a certain indefiniteness in her manner
toward him which he felt a passionate desire to construe. She seemed at
once merciful and merciless, sympathetic and hard. Then, as he looked at
her, he almost forgot all this wilderness of suffering and doubt. All
his intense love for physical beauty, ministered to by the whole manner
of his life, seemed rekindled in her presence. The tragedy of the
present seemed to pass away into the background. From the moment when he
had first caught a glimpse of her in the courtyard of the Palazzo Vechi,
he had chosen her face and presence with which to endow his artist's
ideal--and, since that time, what change there had been in her had been
for the better. The animal spirits of light-hearted girlhood had become
toned down into the more refined and delicate softness of thoughtful
womanhood. In her thin supple figure there was still just the suspicion
of incomplete development, which is in itself a fascination; and her
country attire, the well-cut brown tweed ulster, the cloth cap from
beneath which many little waves of fair silky hair had escaped, the trim
gloves and short skirts--the most insignificant article of her
attire--all seemed to bespeak that peculiar and subtle daintiness which
is at the same time the sweetest and the hardest to define of nature's
gifts to women.

Even in the most acute crisis, woman's care for the physical welfare of
man seems almost an instinct with her. Suddenly turning round, she saw
how ill-protected he was against the weather, and a look of concern
stole into her face.

"How ridiculous of you to come out without an overcoat or anything on
such a day as this!" she exclaimed. "Why, you must be wet through!--and
how cold you look!"

He smiled grimly. That she should think of such a thing just at that
moment, seemed to him to be a peculiar satire upon what had been passing
through his mind concerning her. Then a sudden thrill shook every limb
in his body--his very pulses quickened. She had laid her gloved hand
upon his arm, and, having withdrawn it, was regarding it ruefully. It
was stained with wet.

"You must go home at once!" she said, with a decision in her tone which
was almost suggestive of authority. "You must change all your things,
and get before a warm fire. Come, I will walk with you as far as
Falcon's Nest. I am going round that way, and