pulling it to pieces, all the time he talked. As for me, I sat down
again and took up my work: he should not see that I felt his coldness,
that he had disappointed me.

'I have come very early, I am afraid,' he began, 'but I thought I ought
to let you know. Mrs. Hanbury's little girl, the lame one, Jessie, has
got badly burnt,--some carelessness or other; but they are an ignorant
set, and the child will need your care.'

'I will go at once. Where do they live?' But somehow as I asked the
question I felt as though my voice had lost all tone and sounded like
Miss Darrell's.

He told me, and then gave me the necessary instructions. 'Janet Coombe,
a servant at the Man and Plough, is ill too, and they sent up for me this
morning; it seems a touch of low fever,--nothing really infectious,
though; but the men from the soap-works are having their bean-feast, and
all the folks are too busy to pay Janet much attention.'

'I will see about her,' I returned. 'Are those the only cases, Mr.
Hamilton?' He looked round at me then, as though my quiet matter-of-fact
answer had surprised him, and for a moment he surveyed me gravely and
wistfully; then he seemed to rouse himself with an effort.

'Yes, those are the only cases at present. Thank you, I shall be much
obliged if you will attend to them. Little Jessie is a very delicate
child: things may go hardly with her.' Then he stopped, picked another
spray of jasmine, and pulled off the little starry flowers remorselessly.

'Miss Garston, I want to say something: I feel I owe you some sort of
explanation. I wish to tell you that I have only myself to blame. I have
thought it all over, and I have come to the conclusion that it is no
fault of yours that I misunderstood you. It is your nature to be kind.
You did not wish to mislead me.'

'I am not aware that I ever mislead people,' I returned, rather proudly,
for I could not help feeling a little indignant: Mr. Hamilton was
certainly not treating me well.

'No, of course not,' looking excessively pained. 'I know you too well to
accuse you of that. If I misunderstood you, if I imagined things, it was
my own fault,--mine solely. I would not blame you for worlds.'

'I am glad of that, Mr. Hamilton,' in rather an icy tone.

'No, you could not have told me: I ought to have found it out for myself.
Do you mind if I go away now? I do not feel quite myself, and I would
rather talk of this again another time. Perhaps you will tell me all
a