“But the water feels delicious!” said I.

“And your throat is all scratched and swollen!”

“But your hands are very gentle and soothing!”

“I don’t hurt you, then?”

“On the contrary, the—­the pain is very trifling, thank you.”

“Yet you fainted a little while ago.”

“Then it was very foolish of me.”

“Poor—­” she hesitated, and looking up at her through the trickling water, I saw that she was smiling.

“—­fellow!” said she.  And her lips were very sweet, and her eyes very soft and tender—­for an Amazon.

And, when she had washed the blood from my face, she went to fetch clean water from where I kept it in a bucket in the corner.

Now, at my elbow, upon the table, lay the knife, a heavy, clumsy contrivance I had bought to use in my carpentry, and I now, mechanically, picked it up.  As I did so the light gleamed evilly upon its long blade.

“Put it down!” she commanded; “put it away—­it is a hateful thing!”

“For a woman’s hand,” I added, “so hideously unfeminine!”

“Some men are so hatefully—­hideously—­masculine!” she retorted, her lip curling.  “I expected—­him—­and you are terribly like him.”

“As to that,” said I, “I may have the same colored eyes and hair, and be something of the same build—­”

“Yes,” she nodded, “it was your build, and the color of your eyes and hair that—­startled me.”

“But, after all,” said I, “the similarity is only skin-deep, and goes no farther.”

“No,” she answered, kneeling beside me again; “no, you are—­only twenty-five!” And, as she said this, her eyes were hidden by her lashes.

“Twenty-five is—­twenty-five!” said I, more sharply than before.

“Why do you smile?”

“The water is all dripping from your nose and chin!—­stoop lower over the basin.”

“And yet,” said I, as well as I could on account of the trickling water, for she was bathing my face again, “and yet, you must be years younger than I.”

“But then, some women always feel older than a man—­more especially if he is hurt.”

“Thank you,” said I, “thank you; with the exception of a scratch, or so, I am very well!” But, as I moved, I caught my thumb clumsily against the table-edge, and winced with the sudden pain of it.

“What is it—­your hand?”

“My thumb.”

“Let me see?” Obediently I stretched out my hand to her.

“Is it broken?”

“Dislocated, I think.”

“It is greatly swollen!”

“Yes,” said I, and taking firm hold of it with my left hand, I gave it a sudden pull which started the sweat upon my temples, but sent it back into joint.

“Poor—­”

“Well?” said I, as she hesitated.

“—­man!” said she, and touched the swollen hand very tenderly with her fingers.

“You do not fear me any longer?”