lunch again. Do you know, I begin to hate
Lucretius. He always makes you forget your food."

The old man looked up, and something like a smile passed over his
joyless face when he saw Helen Stanley bending over him.

"Ah," he answered, "you must not hate Lucretius. I have had more
pleasant hours with him than with any living person."

He rose and came forward to examine her copy of Andrea del Sarto's
portrait.

"Yours is better than mine," he said, critically; "in fact, mine is
a failure. I think I shall only get a small price for mine; indeed, I
doubt whether I shall get sufficient to pay for my funeral."

"You speak dismally," she answered, smiling.

"I missed you yesterday," he continued, half dreamily. "I left my work,
and I wandered through the rooms, and I did not even read Lucretius.
Something seemed to have gone from my life. At first I thought it must
be my favourite Raphael, or the Murillo; but it was neither the one nor
the other; it was you. That was strange, wasn't it? But you know we get
accustomed to anything, and perhaps I should have missed you less the
second day, and by the end of a week I should not have missed you at
all. Mercifully, we have in us the power of forgetting."

"I do not wish to plead for myself," she said, "but I do not believe
that you or any one could really forget. That which outsiders call
forgetfulness might be called by the better name of resignation."

"I don't care about talking any more now," he said, suddenly, and he
went to his easel and worked silently at his picture; and Helen Stanley
glanced at him, and thought she had never seen her old companion look
so forlorn and desolate as he did to-day. He looked as if no gentle hand
had ever been placed on him in kindliness and affection, and that seemed
to her a terrible thing; for she was one of those prehistorically minded
persons who persist in believing that affection is as needful to
human life as rain to flower life. When first she came to work at the
gallery--some twelve months ago--she had noticed this old man, and had
wished for his companionship; she was herself lonely and sorrowful, and,
although young, had to fight her own battles, and had learned something
of the difficulties of fighting, and this had given her an experience
beyond her years. She was not more than twenty-four years of age, but
she looked rather older, and, though she had beautiful eyes, full of
meaning and kindness, her features were decided