rn his back to her.
"You aren't very ill, are you, Mr. Bates?"

"No--you--I only can't get my breath. You'd better go, perhaps."

"Yes, I think I had," she replied.

And she went.

CHAPTER IV.

There are many difficulties in this world which, if we refuse to submit
to them, will in turn be subdued by us, but a sprained ankle is not one
of them. Robert Trenholme, having climbed a hill after he had twisted
his foot, and having, contrary to all advice, used it to some extent the
next day, was now fairly conquered by the sprain and destined to be held
by this foot for many long days. He explained to his brother who the
lady was whom he had taken up the hill, why he himself had first
happened to be with her, and that he had slipped with one foot in a
roadside ditch, and, thinking to catch her up, had run across a field
and so missed the lane in the darkness. This was told in the meagre,
prosaic way that left no hint of there being more to tell.

"What is she like?" asked Alec, for he had confessed that he had talked
to the lady.

"Like?" repeated Robert, at a loss; "I think she must be like her own
mother, for she is like none of the other Rexfords."

"All the rest of the family are good-looking."

"Yes," said Robert dreamily.

So Alec jumped to the conclusion that Robert did not consider Miss
Rexford good-looking. He did not tell anything more about her or ask
anything more. He saw no reason for insulting Robert by saying he had at
first overheard her conversation, and that it had been continued to him
after she had mistaken one for the other. He wondered over those of her
remarks which he remembered, and his family pride was hurt by them. He
did not conceive that Robert had been much hurt, simply because he
betrayed no sign of injured feeling. Younger members of a family often
long retain a curiously lofty conception of their elders, because in
childhood they have looked upon them as embodiments of age and wisdom.
Alec, in loose fashion of thought, supposed Robert to be too much
occupied by more important affairs to pay heed to a woman's opinion of
him, but he cherished a dream of some day explaining to Miss Rexford
that she was mistaken in his brother's character. His pulse beat quicker
at the thought, because it would involve nearness to her and equality of
conversation. That Robert had any special fancy for the lady never
entered his mind.

Although we may be willing to abuse those who belong to us