! You must
do as the doctor says--you must make him chuck everything and go."

They had reached a windless nook above the lake, and, pausing in the
stress of their talk, she let herself sink on a bench beside the path.
The movement encouraged him, and he seated himself at her side.

"You must take him away at once," he repeated urgently. "He must be
made comfortable--you must both be free from worry. And I want you to
let me manage it for you--"

He broke off, silenced by her rising blush, her protesting murmur.

"Oh, stop, please; let me explain. I'm not talking of lending you
money; I'm talking of giving you--myself. The offer may be just as
unacceptable, but it's of a kind to which it's customary to accord it a
hearing. I should have made it a year ago--the first day I saw you, I
believe!--but that, then, it wasn't in my power to make things easier
for you. But now, you know, I've had a little luck. Since I painted
Mrs. Millington things have changed. I believe I can get as many orders
as I choose--there are two or three people waiting now. What's the use
of it all, if it doesn't bring me a little happiness? And the only
happiness I know is the kind that you can give me."

He paused, suddenly losing the courage to look at her, so that her
pained murmur was framed for him in a glittering vision of the frozen
lake. He turned with a start and met the refusal in her eyes.

"No--really no?" he repeated.

She shook her head silently.

"I could have helped you--I could have helped you!" he sighed.

She flushed distressfully, but kept her eyes on his.

"It's just that--don't you see?" she reproached him.

"Just that--the fact that I could be of use to you?"

"The fact that, as you say, things have changed since you painted Mrs.
Millington. I haven't seen the later portraits, but they tell me--"

"Oh, they're just as bad!" Stanwell jeered.

"You've sold your talent, and you know it: that's the dreadful part.
You did it deliberately," she cried with passion.

"Oh, deliberately," he interjected.

"And you're not ashamed--you talk of going on."

"I'm not ashamed; I talk of going on."

She received this with a long shuddering sigh, and turned her eyes away
from him.

"Oh, why--why--why?" she lamented.

It was on the tip of Stanwell's tongue to answer, "That I might say to
you what I am just saying now--" but he replied instead: "A man may
paint bad pictures and be a decent fellow. Look at Mungold, after al