“How rich you are in these!” she at last said.  “I have nothing but little pictures.”

“These are yours, Millie.  When you are ready for them I shall place them on your walls myself.”

“Roger,” she said a little brusquely, dashing the tears out of her eyes, “don’t do or say any more kind things to-night, or my self-control will be all gone.”

“On the contrary, I shall ask you to do me a kindness.  Please sit down on this low chair by the fire.  Then I can add the last and best picture to this family gallery.”

She did so hesitatingly, and was provoked to find that her color would rise as he leaned his elbow on the mantel and looked at her intently.  She could not meet his eyes, for there was a heart-hunger in them that seemed to touch her very soul.  “Oh,” she thought, “why doesn’t he—­why can’t he get over it?” and her tears began to flow so fast that he said lightly: 

“That will do, Millie.  I won’t have that chair moved.  Perhaps you think an incipient lawyer has no imagination, but I shall see you there to-morrow night.  Come away now from this room of shadows.  Your first visit to me has cost you so many tears that you will not come again.”

“They are not bitter tears.  It almost seems as if I had found the treasures I had lost.  So far from being saddened, I’m happier than I’ve been since I lost them—­at least I should be if I saw you looking better.  Roger, you are growing thin; you don’t act like your old self.”

“Well, I won’t work late at night any longer if you don’t wish me to,” he replied evasively.

“Make me that promise,” she pleaded eagerly.

“Any promise, Millie.”

She wondered at the slight thrill with which her heart responded to his low, deep tones.

In the library she became a different girl.  A strange buoyancy gave animation to her eyes and a delicate color to her face.  She did not analyze her feelings.  Her determination that Roger should have a pleasant evening seemed to her sufficient to account for the shining eyes she saw reflected in a mirror, and her sparkling words.  She praised his selection of authors, though adding, with a comical look, “You are right in thinking I don’t know much about them.  The binding is just to my taste, whatever may be the contents of some of these ponderous tomes.  There are a good many empty shelves, Roger.”

“I don’t intend to buy books by the cartload,” he replied.  “A library should grow like the man who gathers it.”

“Roger,” she said suddenly, “I think I see some fancy work that I recognize.  Yes, here is more.”  Then she darted back into the sitting-room.  In a moment she returned exclaiming, “I believe the house is full of my work.”

“There is none of your work in the parlors, Millie.”

She ignored the implied reproach in words, but could not wholly in manner.  “So you and Mrs. Wentworth conspired against me, and you got the better of me after all.  You were my magnificent patron.  How could you look me in the face all those months?  How could you watch my busy fingers, looking meanwhile so innocent and indifferent to my tasks?  I used to steal some hours from sleep to make you little gifts for your bachelor room.  They were not fine enough for your lordship, I suppose.  Have you given them away?”