But her hands suddenly arrested his
attention, and he became aware that, for the first time since he had
known her, they were absolutely bare of rings.

"You have no rings to-day," he remarked, his voice showing his surprise.
"I might have wanted to touch up the hands."

Her colour deepened unaccountably. "I thought the hands were finished,"
she breathed, all of a flutter. "Shall I go back for them?"

"What a goose it is!" he said lightly, and she smiled again, as if
pleased they were on so charmingly intimate a footing.

"Shall we not need them?" she asked.

"I think not," he answered, studying the hands a little. "You were
perfectly right; they had best remain as they are."

She took the pose, and for a minute or two he worked silently; she
maintaining the perfect stillness that had at first been her cherished
ambition. He was still pondering about her bare hands and her confusion
at his having observed them, and light came to him. Was it to show him
that no man--not even Mr. Shanner--had any claim on her? After the close
attentions he had witnessed the other evening, was she afraid he might
infer that some understanding existed between herself and Mr.
Shanner?--that one of these rings, even if not a formal pledge, might be
his and worn for his sake? Her neglect of such favourite trinkets to-day
was then to indicate that no one of them had any special sentimental
interest for her!

"You are sitting perfectly to-day," he presently remarked. "It doesn't
tire you?"

"What an unkind suggestion! I thought I had got beyond the amateur stage
long ago."

"I'm sorry. You didn't hear, though, the beginning of my remark."

"I agreed with that," she answered with a sly humour.

"So that it hadn't to be reckoned. Do you know all women are like that?"

She considered. His brush made strokes. "Like what?" she asked at last.

"If you pay them the greatest of tributes, but are incautious enough to
hint the tiniest of qualifications, the tribute dwindles to nothing, and
they remain tremendously annoyed at the suggestion of imperfection."

"Am I like that?"

"You were just now."

"I was such a bother and a hindrance to you when we started," she
explained. "I used to get tired every few minutes. And now at last, just
when I am flattering myself on my improvement----"

"You take me too seriously," he broke in.

"You _were_ serious," she insisted.

"Serious--yes; in so far as I was afraid you were tired. I didn't ev