silent for a minute or two;
then, quitting his chair, asked:

"Had you much talk with her?"

"With Cecily? We were living together, you know."

"Yes, but had she much to tell you? Did she talk about how things were
going with us--what I was doing, and so on?"

He was never still. Now he threw himself into another chair, and
strummed with his fingers on the arm of it.

"She told me about your work."

"And showed that she took very little interest in it, no doubt?"

Miriam gazed at him.

"Why do you think that?"

"Oh, that's tolerably well understood between us." Again he rose, and
paced with his hands in his pockets. "It was a misfortune that Clarence
died. Now she has nothing to occupy herself with. She doesn't seem to
have any idea of employing her time. It was bad enough when the child
was living, but since then--"

He spoke as though the hints fell from him involuntarily; he wished to
be understood as implying no censure, but merely showing an unfortunate
state of things. When he broke off, it was with a shrug and a shake of
the head.

"But I suppose she reads a good deal?" said Miriam; "and has friends to
visit?"

"She seems to care very little about reading nowadays. And as for the
friends--yes, she is always going to some house or other. Perhaps it
would have been better if she had had no friends at all."

"You mean that they are objectionable people?"

"Oh no; I don't mean to say anything of that kind. But--well, never
mind, we won't talk about it."

He threw up an arm, and began to pace the floor again. His nervousness
was increasing. In a few moments he broke out in the same curious tone,
which was half complaining, half resigned.

"You know Cecily, I dare say. She has a good deal of--well, I won't
call it vanity, because that has a vulgar sound, and she is never
vulgar. But she likes to be admired by clever people. One must remember
how young she still is. And that's the very thing of which she can't
endure to be reminded. If I hint a piece of counsel, she feels it an
insult. I suppose I am to blame myself, in some things. When I was
working here of an evening, now and then I felt it a bore to have to
dress and go out. I don't care much for society, that's the fact of the
matter. But I couldn't bid her stay at home. You see how things get
into a wrong course. A girl of her age oughtn't to be going about alone
among all sorts of people. Of course something had to precede that. The
first ye