o foot. She hovered on the brink of her delusions and felt
as though she would soon crash into a precipice. She longed for him to
go before she fell. Yes, she began to long for the time when he should
go, and end this pain, and leave her to the old strange life that had
been so sweet. His living presence killed it.

After that third day she had had no more fears for his safety, and he
was strong and rallied quickly. The gull too was saved. He saved it. It
had drooped and sickened with her. She did not know what to do with it.
On the fourth day as he was so much better, she brought it to him. He
reset its wing and kept it by him, making it his patient and his
playfellow. It thrived at once and grew tame to his hand. He fondled
and talked to it like a lover. She would watch him silently with her
smoldering eyes as he fed and caressed the bird, and jabbered to it in
scraps of a dozen foreign tongues. His tenderness smote her heart.

"You're not very fond of birds," he said to her once, when she had been
sitting in one of her silences while he played with his pet.

The words, question or statement, filled her with anger. She would not
trust herself to protest or deny. "I don't know much about them," she
said.

"That's a pity," said Peter coolly. "The more you know em the more you
have to love em. Yet you could love them for all sorts of things
without knowing them, I'd have thought."

She said nothing.

"For their beauty, now. That's worth loving. Look at this one--you're a
beauty all right, aren't you, my pretty? Not many girls to match you."
He paused, and ran his finger down the bird's throat and breast.
"Perhaps you don't think she's beautiful," he said to Helen.

"Yes, she's beautiful," said Helen, with a difficulty that sounded like
reluctance.

"Ah, you don't think so. You ought to see her flying. You shall some
day. When her hurt's mended she'll fly--I'll let her go."

"Perhaps she won't go," said Helen.

"Oh, yes, she will. How can she stop in a place like this? This is no
air for her--she must fly in her own."

"You'll be sorry to see her go," said Helen.

"To see her free? No, not a bit. I want her to fly. Why should I keep
her? I'd not let her keep me. I'd hate her for it. Why should I make
her hate me?"

"Perhaps she wouldn't," said Helen, in a low voice.

"Oh, I expect she would. Ungrateful little beggar. I've saved her life,
and she ought to know she belongs to me. So she might stay out of