t looking
at my dress (as I supposed) with a steady and anxious attention, gravely
forming his own conclusions, steadfastly pursuing his own train of
thought.

"Mrs. Valeria," he burst out suddenly, "you are not comfortable in that
chair."

"Pardon me," I replied; "I am quite comfortable."

"Pardon _me,_" he rejoined. "There is a chair of Indian basket-work at
that end of the room which is much better suited to you. Will you accept
my apologies if I am rude enough to allow you to fetch it for yourself?
I have a reason."

He had a reason! What new piece of eccentricity was he about to exhibit?
I rose and fetched the chair. It was light enough to be quite easily
carried. As I returned to him, I noticed that his eyes were strangely
employed in what seemed to be the closest scrutiny of my dress. And,
stranger still, the result of this appeared to be partly to interest and
partly to distress him.

I placed the chair near him, and was about to take my seat in it, when
he sent me back again, on another errand, to the end of the room.

"Oblige me indescribably," he said. "There is a hand-screen hanging on
the wall, which matches the chair. We are rather near the fire here. You
may find the screen useful. Once more forgive me for letting you fetch
it for yourself. Once more let me assure you that I have a reason."

Here was his "reason," reiterated, emphatically reiterated, for the
second time! Curiosity made me as completely the obedient servant of his
caprices as Ariel herself. I fetched the hand-screen. Returning with it,
I met his eyes still fixed with the same incomprehensible attention on
my perfectly plain and unpretending dress, and still expressing the same
curious mixture of interest and regret.

"Thank you a thousand times," he said. "You have (quite innocently)
wrung my heart. But you have not the less done me an inestimable
kindness. Will you promise not to be offended with me if I confess the
truth?"

He was approaching his explanation I never gave a promise more readily
in my life.

"I have rudely allowed you to fetch your chair and your screen for
yourself," he went on. "My motive will seem a very strange one, I
am afraid. Did you observe that I noticed you very attentively--too
attentively, perhaps?"

"Yes," I said. "I thought you were noticing my dress."

He shook his head, and sighed bitterly.

"Not your dress," he said; "and not your face. Your dress is dark. Your
face is still strange to me