because she had lost earth; no, and
not to gain earth back again. But how was she to live? And what if she
should be unable always to hide her feeling, and Basil should come to
know it? how would _he_ live? What if she had said strange things in
her days and nights of illness? They were all like a confused misty
landscape to her; nothing taking shape; she could not tell how it might
have been. Restless and weary, she was going over all these and a
thousand other things one day, as she did every day, when Basil came
in. He brought a tray in his hand. He set it down, and came to the
bedside.

"Is it supper-time already?" she asked.

"Are you hungry?"

"I ought not to be hungry. I don't think I am."

"Why ought you not to be hungry?"

"I am doing nothing, lying here."

"I find that is what the people say who are doing too much. Extremes
meet,--as usual."

He lifted Diana up, and piled pillows and cushions at her back till she
was well supported. Nobody could do this so well as Basil. Then he
brought the tray and arranged it before her. There was a bit of cold
partridge, and toast; and Basil filled Diana's cup from a little teapot
he had set by the fire. The last degree of nicety was observable in all
these preparations. Diana ate her supper. She must live, and she must
eat, and she could not help being hungry; though she wondered at
herself that she could be so unnatural.

"Where could you get this bird?" she asked at length, to break the
silence which grew painful.

"I caught it."

"Caught it? _You!_ Shot it, do you mean?"

"No. I had not time to go after it with a gun. But I set snares."

"I never knew partridges were so good," said Diana, though something in
her tone said, unconsciously to her, that she cared not what was good
or bad.

"You did not use your advantages. That often happens."

"I had not the advantage of being able to get partridges," said Diana
languidly.

"The woods are full of them."

"Don't you think it is a pity to catch them?"

"For you?" said Basil. He was removing her empty plate, and putting
before her another with an orange upon it, so accurately prepared that
it stirred her admiration.

"Oranges!" cried Diana. "How did you learn to do everything, Basil?"

"Don't be too curious," said he. As he spoke, he softly put back off
her ear a stray lock of the beautiful brown hair, which fell behind her
like a cloud of wavy brightness. Even from that touch she inwardly
shrank;