“Poor little girl, are you really lonely?” he said.  Even the real feeling in his tone failed to rob his voice of its peculiarly irritating grating quality.  He rose awkwardly, and moved to his wife’s side.

Involuntarily she shrank a little, and the hand which he had stretched out to touch her hair sank to his side.  She recovered herself immediately, and turned her face up to his, though she did not raise her eyes; but he did not kiss her.  Instead, he stood in an embarrassed fashion a moment by her side, and then went back to his seat.

There was silence again for some time.  The man lay back in his chair, gazing at his big, clumsy shoes as though he hoped for some inspiration from that quarter, while his wife worked with nervous haste.

“Don’t let me keep you from reading, John,” she said, and her voice had regained its usual gentle tone.

“No, my dear; I’m just thinking of something to say to you, but I don’t seem—­”

She smiled a little.  In spite of herself, her lip curled faintly.  “Don’t worry about it; it was stupid of me to expect it.  I mean—­” she added, hastily, immediately repenting the sarcasm.  She glanced furtively at him, but his face was quite unmoved; evidently he had not noticed it, and she smiled faintly again.

“O Kathie, I knew there was something I’d forgotten to tell you, my dear; there’s a man coming down here.  I don’t know whether—­”

She looked up sharply.  “A man coming here?  What for?” she interrupted, breathlessly.

“Sent to help me about this oil-boring business, my dear.”

He had lighted his pipe, and was smoking placidly, taking long whiffs between his words.

“Well?” impatiently questioned his wife, fixing her bright eyes on his face.

“Well—­that’s all, my dear.”

She checked an exclamation.  “But don’t you know anything about him—­his name? where he comes from? what he is like?” She was leaning forward against the table, her needle, with a long end of yellow silk drawn half-way through her work, held in her upraised hand, her whole attitude one of quivering excitement and expectancy.

The man took his pipe from his mouth deliberately, with a look of slow wonder.

“Why, Kathie, you seem quite anxious.  I didn’t know you’d be so interested, my dear.  Well,”—­another long pull at his pipe,—­“his name’s Brook—­Brookfield, I think.”  He paused again.  “This pipe doesn’t draw well a bit; there’s something wrong with it, I shouldn’t wonder,” he added, taking it out and examining the bowl as though struck with the brilliance of the idea.

The woman opposite put down her work and clinched her hands under the table.

“Go on, John,” she said, presently, in a tense, vibrating voice; “his name is Brookfield.  Well, where does he come from?”

“Straight from home, my dear, I believe.”  He fumbled in his pocket, and after some time extricated a pencil, with which he began to poke the tobacco in the bowl in an ineffectual aimless fashion, becoming completely engrossed in the occupation apparently.  There was another long pause.  The woman went on working, or feigning to work, for her hands were trembling a good deal.