taying, she desired to contradict what the alien had said, but
she could not do that either. The complete truth of his remark had come
upon her, indeed, with a sudden shock. This man _did_ know her. They
_had_ been through trouble together. Only, it seemed, you never really
got through trouble in this world: it always bobbed up again, waiting
for you, whichever way you turned....

And what did this lame stranger have to do with her, that, of all people
on earth, his eyes alone had twice seen into her heart?...

She looked suddenly up at him from under the engaging little hat, and
said with a smile that was meant to be quite easy and derisive, but
hardly managed to be that:

"Supposing that you do know me, as you say, and that I came to you to
prescribe for me--as a sort of happiness doctor.... Would you say that
to give away everything I had--or papa had--would be the one way for me
to be--happy?"

"Happy?..."

He curled and recurled the corners of the Heth cards, which did not
improve their appearance. He gazed down at the work of his hands, and
there seemed to be no color in his face.

"To be happy.... Oh, no, I shouldn't think that you--that any one--could
be happy just through an act, like that."

"I could hardly give away more than everything all of us had, could I?"

"Well, but don't you think of happiness as a frame of mind, a--a sort of
habit of the spirit? Don't you think it comes usually as a--a by-product
of other things?"

"Oh, but I'm asking you, you see.... What sort of things do you mean?"

He hesitated perceptibly, seeming to take her light derisive remarks
with a strange seriousness.

"Well, I think a--a good rule is to ... to cultivate the sympathies all
the time, and keep doing something useful."

Carlisle continued to look at his downcast face, with the translucent
eyes, and as she looked, the strangest thought shimmered through her,
with a turning of the heart new in her experience. She thought: "This
man is a good friend...."

And then she said aloud, suddenly: "I am not happy--very."

She could not well have regarded that as a Parthian shot, a demolishing
rebuke. Nevertheless, she turned upon it, precipitately, and went away
down the steps.

* * * * *

These events took place, in the course of ten minutes upon a doorstep,
on the 31st of January. On the 27th of February, Carlisle departed, from
the face of her mother's displeasure and all the horri