d in the woods instead of Mr. Hartman, and he might have been
bred in courts, compared with you.--I mean, of course, that I am
interested in him, and sorry for him, as we all are. He is your friend,
and he has excellent qualities."

I was somewhat cast down by all this browbeating. Where shall a man go
for gentle sympathy and that sort of thing, if not to his own sister? I
suppose she thought of this, for she went on more kindly. "I would say
nothing to Clarice if I were you. When she is ready, she will speak--to
you."

"To me, eh? What would she do that for?" I put this in as part of the
narrative, but I am not proud of it. I had not quite recovered yet from
the effect of Jane's previous violence; and then my intellect is not
equal to all these feminine convolutions.

"Brother, your head is not as good as your heart. Don't you understand
that in some cases a woman goes to a man, if there is one of the right
kind at hand, much as a man goes to a woman? You are a man, and Mr.
Hartman's nearest friend. After all her recent confidences with you, or
intimacy at any rate--of course I don't know what she talked with you
about, so many hours--is it surprising that Clarice should turn to you
in her trouble, when she can bring herself to break silence at all? When
she is ready, she will speak to you, and to no one else. Till she is
ready, not all of us together, nor all the world, could draw a word from
her. Must I explain all this to you, as if you were Herbert? And when
she does speak, brother, I do hope that you will listen with due respect
and sympathy, and not disgust and repel her by any more coarse ideas and
base interpretations."

I paid no attention to these last remarks, which seemed to me wholly
unworthy of Jane. Strange, that one who at times displays so much
intelligence and even, as Hartman calls it, discernment, can in other
things be so unappreciative and almost low-minded. Coarse ideas,
indeed! Well, never mind that now: let me meditate on this prospect
which she has opened to my view. So Clarice is coming to me: she knows I
am her best friend after all. Little Clarice, how often have I dandled
her on my knee in the years that have gone by! Dear little
Clarice----BOSH! What an infernal fool a man can make of himself over a
pretty woman in trouble! I am sometimes almost tempted to think that, as
she delicately hinted, there must be an uncommon soft spot in my upper
story. It is bad enough to show it when the