“Yes—­why didn’t I let anybody know?” repeated the girl in an utter panic of bashfulness.

“Oh, I say,” whispered Barton, “won’t you even look at me?”

Mechanically the girl opened her eyes and stared at him fixedly until his own eyes fell.

“Eve!” called her father sharply from the next room, “where in creation is my data concerning North American orchids?”

“In my steamer-trunk,” began the girl.  “On the left hand side.  Tucked in between your riding-boots and my best hat.”

“O—­h,” called her father.

Barton edged forward in his chair and touched the girl’s brown, boyish little hand.

“Really, Miss Eve,” he stammered, “I’m awfully sorry you got hurt!  Truly I am!  Truly it made me feel awfully squeamish!  Really I’ve been thinking a lot about you these last few days!  Honestly I have!  Never in all my life did I ever carry any one as little and hurt as you were!  It sort of haunts me, I tell you.  Isn’t there something I could do for you?”

“Something you could do for me?” said little Eve Edgarton, staring.  Then again the heavy lashes came shadowing down across her cheeks.

“I haven’t had any very great luck,” she said, “in finding you ready to do things for me.”

“What?” gasped Barton.

The big eyes lifted and fell again.  “There was the attic,” she whispered a bit huskily.  “You wouldn’t rent me your attic!”

“Oh, but—­I say!” grinned Barton.  “Some real thing, I mean!  Couldn’t I—­couldn’t I—­read aloud to you?” he articulated quite distinctly, as Edgarton came rustling back into the room with his arms full of papers.

“Read aloud?” gibed Edgarton across the top of his spectacles.  “It’s a daring man, in this unexpurgated day and generation, who offers to read aloud to a lady.”

“He might read me my geology notes,” suggested little Eve Edgarton blandly.

“Your geology notes?” hooted her father.  “What’s this?  Some more of your new-fangled ‘small talk’?  Your geology notes?” Still chuckling mirthlessly, he strode over to the big table by the window and, spreading out his orchid data over every conceivable inch of space, settled himself down serenely to compare one “flower of mystery” with another.

Furtively for a moment Barton sat studying the gaunt, graceful figure.  Then quite impulsively he turned back to little Eve Edgarton’s scowling face.

“Nevertheless, Miss Eve,” he grinned, “I should be perfectly delighted to read your geology notes to you.  Where are they?”

“Here,” droned little Eve Edgarton, slapping listlessly at the loose pile of pages beside her.

Conscientiously Barton reached out and gathered the flimsy papers into one trim handful.  “Where shall I begin?” he asked.

“It doesn’t matter,” murmured little Eve Edgarton.

“What?” said Barton.  Nervously he began to fumble through the pages.  “Isn’t there any beginning?” he demanded.