mean, don't you see, that I believe no other woman could have
influenced my brother as you have."

"You mean, I think, that he has taken his broken heart very lightly,"
said Miss Trotter, with a bitter little laugh, so unlike herself that
Mr. Calton was quite concerned at it.

"No," he said gravely. "I can't say THAT! He's regularly cut up, you
know! And changed; you'd hardly know him. More like a gloomy crank than
the easy fool he used to be," he went on, with brotherly directness. "It
wouldn't be a bad thing, you know, if you could manage to see him, Miss
Trotter! In fact, as he's off his feed, and has some trouble with his
arm again, owing to all this, I reckon, I've been thinking of advising
him to come up to the hotel once more till he's better. So long as SHE'S
gone it would be all right, you know!"

By this time Miss Trotter was herself again. She reasoned, or thought
she did, that this was a question of the business of the hotel, and
it was clearly her duty to assent to Chris's coming. The strange yet
pleasurable timidity which possessed her at the thought she ignored
completely.

He came the next day. Luckily, she was so much shocked by the change in
his appearance that it left no room for any other embarrassment in the
meeting. His face had lost its fresh color and round outline; the lines
of his mouth were drawn with pain and accented by his drooping mustache;
his eyes, which had sought hers with a singular seriousness, no longer
wore the look of sympathetic appeal which had once so exasperated her,
but were filled with an older experience. Indeed, he seemed to have
approximated so near to her own age that, by one of those paradoxes of
the emotions, she felt herself much younger, and in smile and eye showed
it; at which he colored faintly. But she kept her sympathy and inquiries
limited to his physical health, and made no allusion to his past
experiences; indeed, ignoring any connection between the two. He had
been shockingly careless in his convalescence, had had a relapse in
consequence, and deserved a good scolding! His relapse was a reflection
upon the efficacy of the hotel as a perfect cure! She should treat him
more severely now, and allow him no indulgences! I do not know that
Miss Trotter intended anything covert, but their eyes met and he colored
again. Ignoring this also, and promising to look after him occasionally,
she quietly withdrew.

But about this time it was noticed that a change took