canoe, or read, and am
almost happy. After all, Mr. Bingham, it is very wrong and ungrateful
of me to speak like this. I have more advantages than nine-tenths of
the world, and I ought to make the best of them. I don't know why I have
been speaking as I have, and to you, whom I never saw till yesterday.
I never did it before to any living soul, I assure you. It is just like
the story of the man who came here last year with the divining rod.
There is a cottage down on the cliff--it belongs to Mr. Davies, who
lives in the Castle. Well, they have no drinking water near, and the new
tenant made a great fuss about it. So Mr. Davies hired men, and they dug
and dug and spent no end of money, but could not come to water. At last
the tenant fetched an old man from some parish a long way off, who said
that he could find springs with a divining rod. He was a curious old man
with a crutch, and he came with his rod, and hobbled about till at last
the rod twitched just at the tenant's back door--at least the diviner
said it did. At any rate, they dug there, and in ten minutes struck a
spring of water, which bubbled up so strongly that it rushed into the
house and flooded it. And what do you think? After all, the water was
brackish. You are the man with the divining rod, Mr. Bingham, and you
have made me talk a great deal too much, and, after all, you see it is
not nice talk. You must think me a very disagreeable and wicked young
woman, and I daresay I am. But somehow it is a relief to open one's
mind. I do hope, Mr. Bingham, that you will see--in short, that you will
not misunderstand me."

"Miss Granger," he answered, "there is between us that which will always
entitle us to mutual respect and confidence--the link of life and
death. Had it not been for you, I should not sit here to listen to your
confidence to-day. You may tell me that a mere natural impulse prompted
you to do what you did. I know better. It was your will that triumphed
over your natural impulse towards self-preservation. Well, I will say no
more about it, except this: If ever a man was bound to a woman by ties
of gratitude and respect, I am bound to you. You need not fear that I
shall take advantage of or misinterpret your confidence." Here he rose
and stood before her, his dark handsome face bowed in proud humility.
"Miss Granger, I look upon it as an honour done to me by one whom
henceforth I must reverence among all women. The life you gave back to
me, and the i