sed him. He
had assuredly no reason for being more hopeful than before, and matters
were in reality growing more serious every day; but his heart was
lighter and he took a more cheerful view of the future, almost against
his own better judgment.

He had not expected to receive an answer from Maria Consuelo for some
time and was surprised when one came in less than ten days from the date
of his writing. This letter was short, hurriedly written and carelessly
worded, but there was a ring of anxiety for him in every line of it
which he could not misinterpret. Not only did she express the deepest
sympathy for him and assure him that all he did still had the liveliest
interest for her, but she also insisted upon being informed of the state
of his affairs as often as possible. He had spoken of three
possibilities, she said. Was there not a fourth somewhere? There might
often be an issue from the most desperate situation, of which no one
dreamed. Could she not help him to discover where it lay in this case?
Could they not write to each other and find it out together?

Orsino looked uneasily at the lines, and the blood rose to his temples.
Did she mean what she said, or more, or less? He was overwrought and
over-sensitive, and she had written thoughtlessly, as though not
weighing her words, but only following an impulse for which she had no
time to find the proper expression. She could not imagine that he would
accept substantial help from her--still less that he would consent to
marry her for the sake of the fortune which might save him. He grew very
angry, then turned cold again, and then, reading the words again, saw
that he had no right to attach any such meaning to them. Then it struck
him that even if, by any possibility, she had meant to convey such an
idea, he would have no right at all to resent it. Women, he reflected,
did not look upon such matters as men did. She had refused to marry him
when he was prosperous. If she meant that she would marry him now, to
save him from ruin, he could not but acknowledge that she was carrying
devotion near to its farthest limit. But the words themselves would not
bear such an interpretation. He was straining language too far in
suggesting it.

"And yet she means something," he said to himself. "Something which I
cannot understand."

He wrote again, maintaining the tone of his first letter more carefully
than she had done on her part, though not sparing the warmest
expressions o