“What is the best time to call?  The afternoon?—­not too close to meal-time?  Or the evening?  Or Sunday?”

“I’ll tell you,” the librarian said with a brightening face.  “You call her up on the telephone and find out.”

“I’ll do it,” he said, picking up his books and starting away.

He turned back and asked:-

“When you’re speakin’ to a young lady—­say, for instance, Miss Lizzie Smith—­do you say ‘Miss Lizzie’? or ’Miss Smith’?”

“Say ‘Miss Smith,’” the librarian stated authoritatively.  “Say ’Miss Smith’ always—­until you come to know her better.”

So it was that Martin Eden solved the problem.

“Come down any time; I’ll be at home all afternoon,” was Ruth’s reply over the telephone to his stammered request as to when he could return the borrowed books.

She met him at the door herself, and her woman’s eyes took in immediately the creased trousers and the certain slight but indefinable change in him for the better.  Also, she was struck by his face.  It was almost violent, this health of his, and it seemed to rush out of him and at her in waves of force.  She felt the urge again of the desire to lean toward him for warmth, and marvelled again at the effect his presence produced upon her.  And he, in turn, knew again the swimming sensation of bliss when he felt the contact of her hand in greeting.  The difference between them lay in that she was cool and self-possessed while his face flushed to the roots of the hair.  He stumbled with his old awkwardness after her, and his shoulders swung and lurched perilously.

Once they were seated in the living-room, he began to get on easily—­more easily by far than he had expected.  She made it easy for him; and the gracious spirit with which she did it made him love her more madly than ever.  They talked first of the borrowed books, of the Swinburne he was devoted to, and of the Browning he did not understand; and she led the conversation on from subject to subject, while she pondered the problem of how she could be of help to him.  She had thought of this often since their first meeting.  She wanted to help him.  He made a call upon her pity and tenderness that no one had ever made before, and the pity was not so much derogatory of him as maternal in her.  Her pity could not be of the common sort, when the man who drew it was so much man as to shock her with maidenly fears and set her mind and pulse thrilling with strange thoughts and feelings.  The old fascination of his neck was there, and there was sweetness in the thought of laying her hands upon it.  It seemed still a wanton impulse, but she had grown more used to it.  She did not dream that in such guise new-born love would epitomize itself.  Nor did she dream that the feeling he excited in her was love.  She thought she was merely interested in him as an unusual type possessing various potential excellencies, and she even felt philanthropic about it.