me some things, so that I looked different.  Then we went into another house, where she talked with a woman for a long time, and then sat down with me and moved her lips very patiently, motioning me to watch and try to understand.  But I was frightened and couldn’t.  So she gave up and, kissing me, made motions with her hands which I understood better; she wanted me to stay there while she went away, and I promised to if she would come back soon.  At this she took out her watch.  I was pleased with the watch, and she let me look at it, and inside against the cover I saw a picture.  You know whose it was.”

The depths to which her voice sank, the trembling of her tones, startled Ransom.  Had she been less unfortunate, he would have moved to a different seat, but he could not show her a discourtesy after so pitiful a tale.  But the nod he gave her was a grave one, and her cheek flushed and her head fell, as she softly added:  “It was the first time I ever saw a face I liked—­you won’t mind my saying so,—­and I wanted to keep the watch, but sister carried it away.  She didn’t tell me what it meant, her having your picture where she could see it all the time, but when she came again she made me know that you and she were married, by pointing at the picture and then throwing something white over her head; I didn’t ask for the watch after that, but—­”

A far-away look, a trembling of her whole body, finished this ingenuous confession.  Ransom edged himself away and then was sorry for it, for her lip quivered and her hands, from being quiet, began that nervous interlacing of the fingers which bespeaks mental perturbation.

“I am very ignorant,” she faltered; “perhaps I have said something wrong.  I don’t mean to, I want to be a good girl and please you, so that you won’t send me away now sister is gone.  Ah, I know what you want,” she suddenly broke out, as he seized her by the arm and looked inquiringly at her.  “You want me to tell why I jumped out of the carriage that night and vexed Georgian and was naughty and wouldn’t speak to her.  I can’t, I can’t.  You wouldn’t like it if I did.  But I’m sorry now, and will never vex you, but do just what you want me to.  Shall I go up-stairs now?”

He shook his head.  How could he let her go with so much unsaid?  She had talked frankly till she had reached the very place where his greatest interest lay.  Then she had suddenly shown shyness of her subject and leaped the gap, as it were, to the present moment.  How recall her to the hour when she had seen Georgian for the second time?  How urge her into a description of those days succeeding his wife’s flight from the hotel, of which he had no account, save the feverish lines of the letter she had sent him.  He was racking his brain for some method of communicating his wishes to Anitra, when he heard steps behind him, and, turning, saw the clerk approaching him with a telegram.

He glanced at her slyly as he took it.  Somehow he couldn’t get used to her deafness, and expected her to give some evidence of surprise or curiosity.  But she was still studying her hands, and as his eyes lingered on her downcast face he saw a tear well from her lids and wet the cheek she held partly turned from him.  He wanted to kiss that tear, but refrained and opened his telegram instead.  It was from Mr. Harper, and ran thus: