it 's not worth
the trouble. Live as most amuses you!"

"Your perplexities are so terribly comprehensive," said Rowland,
smiling, "that one hardly knows where to meet them first."

"I don't care much for anything you can say, because it 's sure to be
half-hearted. You are not in the least contented, yourself."

"How do you know that?"

"Oh, I am an observer!"

"No one is absolutely contented, I suppose, but I assure you I complain
of nothing."

"So much the worse for your honesty. To begin with, you are in love."

"You would not have me complain of that!"

"And it does n't go well. There are grievous obstacles. So much I know!
You need n't protest; I ask no questions. You will tell no one--me least
of all. Why does one never see you?"

"Why, if I came to see you," said Rowland, deliberating, "it would n't
be, it could n't be, for a trivial reason--because I had not been in a
month, because I was passing, because I admire you. It would be because
I should have something very particular to say. I have not come, because
I have been slow in making up my mind to say it."

"You are simply cruel. Something particular, in this ocean of inanities?
In common charity, speak!"

"I doubt whether you will like it."

"Oh, I hope to heaven it 's not a compliment!"

"It may be called a compliment to your reasonableness. You perhaps
remember that I gave you a hint of it the other day at Frascati."

"Has it been hanging fire all this time? Explode! I promise not to stop
my ears."

"It relates to my friend Hudson." And Rowland paused. She was looking at
him expectantly; her face gave no sign. "I am rather disturbed in mind
about him. He seems to me at times to be in an unpromising way." He
paused again, but Christina said nothing. "The case is simply this,"
he went on. "It was by my advice he renounced his career at home and
embraced his present one. I made him burn his ships. I brought him to
Rome, I launched him in the world, and I stand surety, in a measure,
to--to his mother, for his prosperity. It is not such smooth sailing as
it might be, and I am inclined to put up prayers for fair winds. If he
is to succeed, he must work--quietly, devotedly. It is not news to you,
I imagine, that Hudson is a great admirer of yours."

Christina remained silent; she turned away her eyes with an air, not
of confusion, but of deep deliberation. Surprising frankness had, as a
general thing, struck Rowland as the key-note of her chara