“Mr. Atwood, I suppose I have as much vanity as most girls, but you make me blush.  You are indeed dazed, for you appear to take me for a melodramatic heroine.”

“Pardon me, I do not.  I’ve been to the theatre occasionally, but you are not at all theatrical.  You are not like the heroines of the novels I’ve read, and I suppose I’ve read too many of them.”

“I fear you have,” she remarked dryly.  “Pray, then, What am I like?”

“And I may seem to you a hero of the dime style; but wait, don’t decide yet.  What are you like?  You are gentle, like your mother.  You are exceedingly fond of all that’s pretty and refined, so much so that you tried to introduce a little grace into our meagre, angular farmhouse life—­”

“Thanks for your aid,” interrupted Mildred, laughing.  “I must admit that you have good eyes.”

“You shrink,” he resumed, “from all that’s ugly, vulgar, or coarse in life.  You are an unhappy exile in our plain home.”

“All which goes to prove what an ordinary and unheroic nature I have.  You will soar far beyond me, Mr. Atwood, for you have portrayed a very weak character—­one that is in love with the niceties of life, with mere prettiness.”

“You are still laughing at me, but I’m in earnest; and if you mean what, you say, you understand yourself less than you do me.  Why will you not go to the hotel occasionally?  Because with all your gentleness you are too proud to run the slightest risk of patronage and pity from those who knew you in your more fortunate days.  Why do you remain in your little hot room so much of the time?  I don’t know; but if you will permit a guess, you are working.  Every day you grow less content to sit still in helpless weakness.  You are far braver than I, for I do not fear the world in the least; but, no matter how much you feared it, you would do your best to the last, and never yield to anything in it that was low, base, or mean.  Oh, you are very gentle, very delicate, and you will be misunderstood; but you have the strongest strength there is—­a kind of strength that will carry you through everything, though it cost you dear.”

“And what may that be?” she asked, looking at him now in genuine wonder.

“I can’t explain exactly what I mean.  It is something I’ve seen in mother, plain and simple as she is.  It’s a kind of enduring steadfastness; it’s a patient faithfulness.  I should know just where to find mother, and just what to expect from her, under all possible circumstances.  I should never expect to see you very different from what you are, no matter what happened.  You often have the same look or expression that she has; and it means to me that you would do the best you could, although discouraged and almost hopeless.  Very few soldiers will fight when they know the battle is going against them.  You would, as long as you could move a finger.”

“Mr. Atwood, what has put all this into your head?  This seems very strange language from you.”