'I don't know. I think Mrs. Dallas told papa.'

'Well, now look here, Queen Esther,' Pitt said, more moderately: 'I
told you, in the first place, you are not to judge by appearances. Do
you see that you have been mistaken in judging me?'

She looked at him, a look that moved him a good deal, there was so much
wistfulness in it; so much desire revealed to find him what she had
found him in times past, along with the dawning hope that she might.

'Yes,' said he, nodding, 'you have been mistaken, and I did not expect
it of you, Queen Esther. I don't think I am changeable; but anyhow, I
haven't changed towards you. I have but just got home this evening; and
I ran away from home and my mother as soon as we had done supper, that
I might come and see you.'

Esther smiled: she was pleased, he saw.

'And in the next place, as to that crotchet of your not seeing much
more of me, I can't imagine how it ever got up; but it isn't true,
anyhow. I expect you'll see an immense deal of me. I may go some time
to England; about that I can't tell; but if I go, I shall come back
again, supposing I am alive. And now, do you see that it would be very
foolish of you to try to get accustomed to doing without me? for I
shall not let you do it.'

'I don't want to do it,' said Esther confidingly; 'for you know I have
nobody else except you and papa.'

'What put such an absurd notion in your head! You a Stoic, Queen
Esther! You look like it!'

'What is a Stoic?'

'The sort of people that bite a nail in two, and smile as if it were a
stick of peppermint candy.'

'I didn't know there were any such people.'

'No, naturally. So it won't do for you to try to imitate them.'

'But I was not trying anything like that.'

'What were you trying to do, then?'

Esther hesitated.

'I thought--I must do without you; and so--I thought I had better not
think about you.'

'Did you succeed?'

'Not very well. But--I suppose I could, in time.'

'See you don't! What do you think in that case _I_ should do?'

'Oh, you!' said Esther; 'that is different. I thought you would not
care.'

'Did you! You did me honour. Now, Queen Esther, let us understand this
matter. I do care, and I am going to care, and I shall always care. Do
you believe it?'

'I always believe what you say,' said the girl, with a happy change in
her face, which touched Pitt again curiously. Somehow, the contrast
between his own strong, varied, rich, and active life, with its
ab