"Do?" I asked. "There is nothing to do except to begin writing where you left off. The wasp is dead."

"I wish it had never been born," she said. "I have no doubt that the whole affair should come to an end now, and that I ought to go home; but I can't do that until Sister Sarah comes to unlock the door, and so I suppose we had better go to work."

"We"! I would not have dared to use that word, but it fell from her lips in the easiest and most conventional manner possible. It was delightful to hear it. I never knew before what a pleasant sound the word had. She now set herself to work to gather up the papers from the floor, and, having arranged them in their proper order, she took up her bonnet.

"Do you have to wear that?" I asked.

"Certainly," she answered, clapping it on and pulling it well forward.

"I should think it would be very hot and uncomfortable," I remarked.

"It is," she admitted curtly; and, seating herself at the table, she took up her pen.

I now perceived that if I knew what was good for myself I would cease from speaking on ordinary topics, and go on with my dictation. This I did, giving out my sentences as rapidly as possible, although I must admit I took no interest whatever in what I was saying, nor do I believe that my secretary was interested in the subject-matter of my work. She wrote rapidly, and, as well as I could judge, appeared excited and annoyed. I was excited also, but not in the least disturbed. My emotions were of a highly pleasing character. We worked steadily for some twenty minutes, when suddenly she stopped and laid down her pen.

"Of course it isn't right to speak," she said, turning in her chair and speaking to me face to face, as one human being to another, "but as I have said so much already, I don't suppose a little more will make matters worse, and I must ask somebody's help in making up my mind what I ought to do. I suspect I have made all sorts of mistakes in this writing, but I could not keep my thoughts on my work. I have been trying my best to decide how I ought to act, but I cannot make up my mind."

"I shall be delighted to help you, if I can," I ventured. "What's the point that you cannot decide?"

"It is just this," she replied, fixing her blue eyes upon me with earnest frankness: "am I to tell the sisters what has happened or not? If I tell them, I know exactly what will be the result: I shall come here no more, and I shall have to take Sister Hannah's place at the Measles Refuge. There's nothing in this world that I hate like measles. I've had them, but that doesn't make the slightest difference. Sister Hannah has asked to be relieved, and I know she wants this place dreadfully."

"She cannot come here!" I exclaimed. "I don't believe I ever had the measles, and I will not have them."

"She is a stenographer," said she, "and she will most certainly be ordered to take my place if I make known what I have done to-day."

"Supposing you were sure that you were not obliged to go to the Measles Refuge," I asked, "should you still regret giving up this position?"

"Of course I should," she answered promptly. "I must work at something, or I cannot stay in the House of Martha; and there is no work which I like so well as this. It interests me extremely."

"Now hear me," said I, speaking perhaps a little too earnestly, "and I do not believe any one could give you better advice than I am going to give you. What has occurred this morning was strictly and absolutely an accident. A wasp came in at the window and tried to sting you; and there is no woman in the world, be she a sister or not, who could sit still and let a wasp sting her."

"No," she interrupted, "I don't believe Mother Anastasia could do it."

"And what followed," I continued, "was perfectly natural, and could not possibly be helped. You were obliged to defend yourself, and in so doing you were obliged to act just as any other woman would act. Nothing else would have been possible, and the talking and all that came in with the rest. You couldn't help it."

"That's the way the matter appeared to me," said she; "but the question would arise, if it were all right, why should I hesitate to tell the sisters?"

"Hesitate!" I exclaimed. "You should not even think of such a thing. No matter what the sisters really thought about it, I am sure they would not let you come here any more, and you would be sent to the measles institution, and thus actually be punished for the attempted wickedness of a wasp."

"But there is the other side of the matter," said she; "would it not be wicked in me not to tell them?"

"Not at all," I replied. "You do not repeat to the sisters all that I tell you to write?"

"Of course not," she interrupted.

"And you do not consider it your duty," I continued, "to relate every detail of the business in which you are employed?"

"No," she said. "They ask me some things, and some things I have mentioned to them, such as not having a gold pen."

"Very good," said I. "You should consider that defending yourself against wasps is just as much your business here as anything else. If you are stung, it is plain you can't write, and the interests of your employer and of the House of Martha must suffer."

"Yes," she assented, still with the steady gaze of her blue eyes.

"Now your duty is clear," I went on. "If the sisters ask you if a wasp flew into your room and tried to sting you, and you had to jump around and kill it, and speak, before you could go on with your work, why, of course you must tell them; but if they don't ask you, don't tell them. It may seem ridiculous to you," I continued hurriedly, "to suppose that they would ask such a question, but I put it in this way to show you the principle of the thing."

She withdrew her eyes from my face, and fixed them upon the floor.

"The truth of the matter is," she said presently, "that I haven't done anything wrong; at least I didn't intend to. I might have crouched down in the corner, with my face to the wall, and have covered my head and hands with my shawl, but I should have been obliged to stay there until Sister Sarah came, and I should have been smothered to death; and besides, I didn't think of it; so what I did do was the only thing I could do, and I do not think I ought to be punished for it."

"Now it is settled," I said. "Your duty is to work here for the benefit of your sisterhood, and you should not allow a wasp or any insect to interfere with it."

She looked at me, and smiled a little abstractedly. Then she turned to the table.

"I will go on with my work," she said, "and I will not say anything to the sisters until I have given the matter most earnest and careful consideration. I can do that a great deal better at home than I can here."

It was very well that she stopped talking and applied herself to her work, for I do not believe it was ten minutes afterward when Sister Sarah unlocked the door, and came in to take her away.



XIV.

I FAVOR PERMANENCY IN OFFICE.

As soon as my secretary had gone I went into her room and looked for my friend Vespa. I found him on the floor, quite dead, but not demolished. Picking him up and carrying him to my study, I carefully gummed him to a card. Under his motionless form I wrote, "The good services of this friend I shall ever keep in grateful remembrance." Then I pinned the card to the wall between two bookcases.

During the rest of that day I found myself in a state of unreasonable exaltation. Several times I put to myself the questions: Why is it that you feel so cheerful and so gay? Why have you the inclination to whistle and to dance in your room? Why do you light a cigar, and let it go out through forgetfulness? Why do you answer your grandmother at random, and feel an inclination to take a long walk by yourself, although you know there are people invited to an afternoon tea?

I was not able to give an adequate answer to these questions, nor did I very much care to. I knew that my high spirits were caused by the discoveries the good Vespa had enabled me to make, and the fact that this reason could not be proved adequate did not trouble me at all; but prudence and a regard for my own interests made it very plain to me that other people should not know I had been exalted, and how. If I desired my nun to continue as my secretary, I must not let any one know that I cared in the least to hear her voice, or to have the front of her bonnet turned towards me.

At dinner, that day, my grandmother remarked to me:—

"Are you still satisfied with the House of Martha's sister? Does she do your work as you wish to have it done?"

I leaned back in my chair, and answered with deliberation:—

"Yes, I think she will do very well, and that after more practice she will do better. As it is, she is industrious and attentive. I place great stress upon that point, for I do not like to repeat my sentences; but she has a quick ear, and catches every word."

"Then," asked my grandmother, "you do not wish to make a change at present?"

"Oh, no," I said; "it would be very annoying to begin again with a new amanuensis. I am getting accustomed to this person, and that is a very important matter with me. So I do not wish to make any change so long as this sister does her work properly."

"I must say," resumed my grandmother, after a little pause, in which she seemed to be considering the subject, "that I was not altogether in favor of that young woman taking the position of your secretary. She can have had but little experience, and I thought that an older and steadier person would answer your purpose much better; but this one was unemployed at the time, and wished very much to do literary work; and as the institution needed the money you would pay, which would probably amount to a considerable sum if your book should be a long one, and as you were in a great hurry, and might engage some one from the city if one of the Martha sisters were not immediately available, Mother Anastasia and I concluded that it would be well to send this young person until one of the older sisters, competent for the work, should be disengaged. I thought you would be very anxious to have this change made as soon as possible, so that you might feel that you had a permanent secretary."

"Oh, no," said I, trying very hard not to appear too much in earnest. "This person is very steady, and there is a certain advantage in her being young, without much experience as a secretary. I wish any one who writes for me to work in my way; and if such a person has been accustomed to work in other people's ways, annoyance and interruption must surely result, and that I wish very much to avoid. A secretary should be a mere writing-machine, and I do not believe an elderly person could be that. She would be sure to have notions how my work should or should not be done, and in some way or other would make those notions evident."

"I don't quite agree with you," said my grandmother, "but of course you know your own business better than I do; and I suppose, after all, it doesn't make much difference whether the sister is young or not. They all dress alike, and all look ugly alike. I don't suppose there would be anything attractive about the Venus de Milo, if she wore a coal-scuttle bonnet and a gray woolen shawl."

"No," I answered, "especially if she kept the opening of her coal-scuttle turned down over her paper, as if she were about to empty coals upon it."

"That's very proper," said my grandmother, speaking a little more briskly. "All she has to do is to keep her eyes on her work, and I suppose, from what you say, that the flaps of her bonnet do not interfere with her keeping her ears on you. But if at any time you desire to make a change, all you have to do is to let me know, and I can easily arrange the matter."

I promised that I would certainly let her know in case I had such a desire.

That evening Walkirk remarked to me that he thought nothing could be more satisfactory for me than to have on tap, so to speak, an institution like the House of Martha, from which I could draw a secretary whenever I wanted one, and keep her for as long or as short a time as pleased me; and to have this supply in the immediate neighborhood was an extraordinary advantage.

I agreed that the arrangement was a very good one; and I think he was about to ask some questions in regard to my nun, but I began my recital, and cut off any further conversation on the subject.

My monologue was rather disjointed that evening, for my mind was occupied with other things, or, more strictly speaking, another thing. I felt quite sure, however, that Walkirk did not notice my preoccupation, for he gave the same earnest and interested attention to my descriptions which he had always shown, and which made him such an agreeable and valuable listener. Indeed, his manner put me at my ease, because, on account of the wandering of my mind, his general expression indicated that, if I found it necessary to pause in order that I might arrange what I should say next, he was very glad of the opportunity thus given him to reflect upon what I had just said. He was an admirable listener.



XV.

HOW WE WENT BACK TO GENOA.

The next morning I awaited with considerable perturbation of mind the arrival of my nun. I felt assured that, after the occurrences of the previous day, there must certainly be some sort of a change in her. She could not go on exactly as she had gone on before. The nature of this anticipated change concerned me very much,—too much, I assured myself. Would she be more rigid and repellent than she had been before the advent of the wasp? But this would be impossible. On the other hand, would she be more like other people? Would she relax a little, and work like common secretaries? Or,—and I whistled as I thought of it,—having once done so, would she permanently cut loose from the absurdities enjoined upon her by the House of Martha people, and look at me and talk to me in the free, honest, ingenuous, frank, sincere, and thoroughly sensible manner in which she had spoken to me the day before?

After revolving these questions in my mind for some time, another one rudely thrust itself upon me: would she come at all? It was already seven minutes past nine; she had never been so late. Now that I came to think of it, this would be the most natural result of the wasp business. The thought shocked me. I ceased to walk up and down my study, and stopped whistling. I think my face must have flushed; I know my pulse beat faster. My eyes fell upon the body of him who I believed had been my friend. I felt like crushing his remains with my fist. He had been my enemy! He had shown me what I had to lose, and he had made me lose it.

Even in the midst of my agitation this thought made me smile. How much I was making of this affair of my secretary. What difference, after all—But I did not continue the latter question. It did make a difference, and it was of no use to reason about it. What was I to do about it? That was more to the point.

At this instant, my nun, followed by Sister Sarah, entered the adjoining room. The latter merely bowed to me, went out, and locked the door behind her. I was very glad she did not speak to me, for the sudden revulsion of feeling produced by the appearance of the two would have prevented my answering her coherently. I do not know whether my nun bowed or not. If she did, the motion was very slight. She took her seat and prepared for work. I did not say anything, for I did not know what to say. The proper thing to do, in order to relieve my embarrassment and hers,—that is, if she had any,—was to begin work at once; but for the life of me I could not remember whether my dictation of the day before concerned Sicily or Egypt. I did not like to ask her, for that would seem like a trick to make her speak.

But it would not do to keep her sitting there with an idle pen in her hand. I must say something, so I blurted out some remarks concerning the effect of the climate of the Mediterranean upon travelers from northern countries; and while doing this I tried my best to remember where, on the shores of this confounded sea, I had been the day before.

Philosophizing and generalizing were, however, not in my line: I was accustomed to deal with action and definite observation, and I soon dropped the climate of the Mediterranean, and went to work on some of the soul-harrowing improvements in the Eternal City, alluding with particular warmth to the banishment of the models from the Spanish Stairs. Now the work went on easily, but I was gloomy and depressed. My nun sat at the table, more like a stiff gray-enveloped principle than ever before. I did not feel at liberty even to make a remark about the temperature of the room. I feared that whatever I said might be construed into an attempt to presume upon the accidental intercourse of the day before.

For half an hour or more she went on with the work, but, during a pause in my dictation, she sat up straight in her chair and laid down her pen. Then, without turning her face to me, she began to speak. I stood open-mouthed, and, I need not say, delighted. Whatever her words might be, it rejoiced me to hear them; to know that she voluntarily recognized my existence, and desired to communicate with me.

"I have spoken to Mother Anastasia," she said, her voice directed towards the screen in the open window, "and I told her that it was impossible for me to work without sometimes saying a few words to ask for what I need, or to request you to repeat a word which I did not catch. Since I began to write I have lost no less than twenty-three words. I have left blanks for them, and made memoranda of the pages; but, as I said to her, if this sort of thing went on, you would forget what words you had intended to use, and when you came to read the manuscript you could not supply them, and that therefore I was not doing my work properly, and honestly earning the money which would be paid to the institution. I also told her that you sometimes forgot where you left off the day before, and that I ought to read you a few lines of what I had last written, in order that you might make the proper connection. I think this is very necessary, for to-day you have left an awful gap. Yesterday we were writing about that old Crusader's bank in Genoa, and now you are at work at Rome, when we haven't even started for that city."

Each use of this word "we" was to me like a strain of music from the heavens.

"Do you think I did right?" she added.

"Right!" I exclaimed. "Most assuredly you did. Nothing could be more helpful, and in fact more necessary, than to let me know just where I left off. What did the sisters say?"

"I spoke only to Mother Anastasia," she replied. "She considered the matter a little while, and then said that she could see there must be times when you would require some information from me in regard to the work, and that there could be no reasonable objection to my giving such information; but she reminded me that the laws of the House of Martha require that the sisters must give their sole attention to the labor upon which they are employed, and must not indulge, when so engaged, in any conversation, even among themselves, that is not absolutely necessary."

"Mother Anastasia is very sensible," said I, "and if I were to see her, I should be happy to express my appreciation of her good advice upon the subject. And, by the way, did she tell you that it was necessary to wear that hot bonnet while you are working?"

"She did not say anything about it," she answered; "it was not needful. We always wear our bonnets outside of the House of Martha."

I was about to make a further remark upon the subject, but restrained myself: it was incumbent on me to be very prudent. There was a pause, and then she spoke again.

"You are not likely to see Mother Anastasia," she said, "but please do not say anything on the subject to Sister Sarah; she is very rigorous, and would not approve of talking under any circumstances. In fact, she does not approve of my coming here at all."

"What earthly reason can she have for that?" I asked.

"She thinks it's nonsensical for you to have a secretary," she answered, "and that it would be much better for you to do your own work, and make a gift of the money to the institution, and then I could go and learn to be a nurse. I only mention these things to show you that it would be well not to talk to her of Mother Anastasia's good sense."

"You may rest assured," said I, "that I shall not say a word to her."

"And now," said she, "shall we put aside what I have written to-day, and go back to Genoa? The last thing you dictated yesterday was this: 'Into this very building once came the old Crusaders to borrow money for their journeys to the Holy Land.'"

We went to Genoa.

"How admirably," I exclaimed, when she had gone, "with what wonderful tact and skill she has managed the whole affair! Not one word about the occurrences of yesterday, not an allusion which could embarrass either herself or me. If only she had looked at me! But she had probably received instructions on that point which she did not mention, and it is easy to perceive that she is honest and conscientious."

But after all it was not necessary that I should see her face. I had seen it, and I could never forget it.

Whistling was not enough for me that day; I sang.

"What puts you into such remarkably good spirits?" asked my grandmother. "Have you reached an unusually interesting part of your work?"

"Indeed I have," I answered, and I gave her such a glowing account of the way the Red Cross Knights, the White Cross Knights, and the Black Cross Knights clanked through the streets of Genoa, before setting sail to battle for the Great Cross, that the cheeks of the old lady flushed and her eyes sparkled with enthusiastic emotion.

"I don't wonder it kindles your soul to write about such things," she said.



XVI.

I RUN UPON A SANDBAR.

Day by day, the interest of my nun in her work appeared to increase. Every morning, so soon as she sat down at her table, she read to me the concluding portion of what had been written the day before; and if a Sunday intervened, she gave me a page or more. Her interest was manifested in various ways. Several times she so far forgot the instructions she must have received as to turn her face towards me, when asking me to repeat something that she did not catch, and on such occasions I could not for some moments remember what I had said, or indeed what I was about to say.

Once she stopped writing, and, turning half round in her chair, looked fairly at me, and said that she thought I had made a mistake in saying that visitors were not allowed to go up the Tower of Pisa without a guide; for she, with two other ladies, had gone to the top without any one accompanying them. But she thought it was very wrong to allow people to do this, and that I should be doing a service to travelers if I were to say something on the subject.

Of course I replied that I would make the correction, and that I would say something about the carelessness to which she referred. Then there ensued a pause, during which she turned her face towards the window, imagining, I have no doubt, that I was busy endeavoring to compose something suitable to say upon the subject; but I was not thinking of anything of the sort. I was allowing my mind to revel in the delight which I had had in looking at her while she spoke. When her pen began to scratch impatiently upon the paper, I plunged into some sort of a homily on the laxity of vigilance in leaning towers. But, even while dictating this, I was wondering what she would look like if, instead of that gray shawl and gown, she were arrayed in one of the charming costumes which often make even ordinary young ladies so attractive.

As our daily work went on, my nun relaxed more frequently her proscribed rigidity, and became more and more like an ordinary person. When she looked at me or spoke, she always did so in such an unpremeditated manner, and with such an obvious good reason, that I could not determine whether her change of manner was due to accumulative forgetfulness, or to a conviction that it was absurd to continue to act a part which was not only unnatural under the circumstances, but which positively interfered with the work in hand. Some of her suggestions were of the greatest service, but I fear that the value of what she said was not as fully appreciated as was the pleasure of seeing and hearing her say it.

Thus joyously passed the hours of work, and in the hours when I was not working I looked forward with glad anticipation to the next forenoon; but after a time I began to be somewhat oppressed by the fear that my work would come to an end before long for want of material. I was already nearing the southern limit of my travels, and my return northward had not been productive of the sort of subject-matter I desired. In my recitals to Walkirk I had gone much more into detail regarding my experiences, and had talked about a great many things which it had been pleasant to talk about, but which I did not consider good enough to put into my book. In dictating to my nun I had carefully sifted the mass to which Walkirk had listened, and had used only such matter as I thought would interest her and the general reader. My high regard for the intelligence of my secretary and her powers of appreciation had led me to discard too much, and therefore there was danger that my supply of subject-matter would give out before my nun grew to be an elderly woman; and this I did not desire.

I had read and heard enough of the travels of others to be able to continue my descriptions of foreign countries for an indefinite period; but I had determined, from the first, that nothing should go into my book except my own actual experiences, and therefore I could not rely upon other books for the benefit of mine. But, in considering the matter, I concluded that, if my material should be entirely my own, it would answer my purpose to make that material what I pleased; and thus it happened that I determined to weave a story into my narrative. This plan, I assured myself, would be in perfect harmony with the design of my work. The characters could be drawn from the people whom I had met in my travels. The scenes could be those which I had visited, and the plot and tone of the story could be made to aid the reader in understanding the nature of the country and the people of which it was told. More than all, I could make the story as long as I pleased.

This was a capital idea, and I began immediately to work upon it. I managed the story very deftly; at least that was my opinion. My two principal characters made their appearance in Sicily, and at first were so intermingled with scenery and incidents as not to be very prominent; then they came more to the front, and other characters introduced themselves upon occasion. As these personages appeared and reappeared, I hoped that they would gradually surround themselves with an interest which would steadily increase the desire to know more and more about them. Thus, as I went on, I said less and less about Sicily, and more and more about my characters, especially the young man and the young woman, the curious blending of whose lives I was endeavoring to depict.

This went on very smoothly for a few days, and then, about eleven o'clock one morning, my nun suddenly leaned back in her chair and laid down her pen.

"I cannot write any more of this," she said, looking out of the window.

I was so astonished that I could scarcely ask her what she meant.

"This is love-making," she continued, "and with love-making the sisters of the House of Martha can have nothing to do. It is one of our principal rules that we must not think about it, read about it, or talk about it; and of course it would have been forbidden to write about it, if such a contingency had ever been thought of. Therefore I cannot do any more work of that kind."

In vain I expostulated; in vain I told her that this was the most important part of my book; in vain I declaimed about the absurdity of such a regulation; in vain I protested; in vain I reasoned. She shook her head, and said there was no use talking about it; she knew the rules, and should obey them.

I had been standing near the grating, but now I threw myself into a chair, and sat silent, wondering what I should do. Must I give up this most admirable plan of carrying on my work, simply because those foolish sisters had made absurd rules for themselves? Must I wind up my book for want of material? Not for a moment did I think of getting another secretary, or of selecting some other sort of that stuff which literary people call padding, for the purpose of prolonging my pleasant labors. I was becoming interested in the love-story I had begun, and I wanted to go on with it, and I believed also that it would be of great advantage to my book; but, on the other hand, it was plain that my nun would not write this story, and it was quite as plain to me that I could not insist upon anything which would cause her to leave me.

"Don't you think," she said presently, still looking towards the window, "that we had better do some sort of work for the rest of the morning? It is not right for me to sit here idle. Suppose you try to supply some of the words which were left out of the manuscript, in the first days of my writing for you."

"Very well," said I; and, taking up her memoranda, she began to look for the vacant spaces which she had left in the manuscript pages. I supplied very few words, for to save my life I could not at this moment bring my mind to bear upon such trifles; but it was pretense of work, and better than embarrassing idleness. Before my secretary left me I must think of something to say to her in regard to the work for to-morrow; but what should I say? Should I tell her I would drop the story, or that I would modify it so as to make it feasible for her to write? Something must quickly be decided upon, and while I was tumultuously revolving the matter in my mind twelve o'clock and the sub-mother came. My secretary went away, with nothing but the little bow which she was accustomed to make when leaving the room.



XVII.

REGARDING THE ELUCIDATION OF NATIONAL CHARACTERISTICS.

I was left in my study in a very unpleasant state of mind. I was agitated and apprehensive. Perhaps that young woman would not come any more. I had not told her that I was going to stop writing about love, and there was every reason to suppose she would not return. What an imbecile I had been! I had done nothing, because I could not think of exactly the right thing to do.

I now felt that I must ask the advice of somebody in regard to this embarrassing and important affair. For a moment I thought of my grandmother, but she would be sure to begin by advising me to change my secretary. She seldom urged me to do what I did not want to do, but if I offered her a chance to give me advice on this occasion I knew what would be uppermost in her mind.

So I put on my hat and went to Walkirk, at the inn. I found him at work on a mass of accounts, dating back for years, which I had given him to adjust. With great circumspection I laid before him this new affair.

"You see," said I, "she is a first-class secretary. She has learned to do my work as I like it done, and I do not wish to make a change, and, on the other hand, I do not care to alter the plan of my book."

Walkirk was always very respectful, but he could not restrain a smile at the situation.

"It does seem to me," he said, "a very funny thing to dictate a love-story to one of the sisters of the House of Martha. Of course they are not nuns, they are not even Roman Catholics, but they are just as strict and strait-laced about certain things as if their house were really a convent. So far as I can see, there is but one thing to do, and that is to confine yourself to descriptions of travel; and perhaps it would be well to let your secretary know in some way that you intend to do so; otherwise I think she may throw up the business, and that would be a pity."

It sometimes surprises me to discover what an obstinate person I am. When I want to do a thing, it is very difficult for me to change my mind.

"She must not throw up the business," I said, "and I do not see how I can leave out the story. I have planned it far ahead, and to discard it I should have to go back and cut and mangle a great deal of good work that I have done."

Walkirk reflected.

"I admit," he replied, "that that would be very discouraging. Perhaps we can think of some plan of getting out of the difficulty."

"I hope you can do that," said I, "for I cannot."

"How would this do?" he asked presently. "Suppose I go and see Mother Anastasia this afternoon, and try and make her look at this matter from a strictly business point of view. I can tell her that the sort of thing you are doing is purely literature, that you can't keep such things out of literature, and that the people who engage in the mechanical work of literature cannot help running against those things at one time or another. I can try to make her understand what an advantageous connection this is, and what a great injury to the House of Martha it would be if it should be broken off. I can tell her that it is not improbable that you may take to writing as a regular business, and that you may give profitable employment to the sisters for years and years. There are a good many other things I might say, and you may be sure I shall do my very best."

"Go," I said, "but be very careful about what you say. Don't make her think that I am too anxious to retain this particular sister, but make her understand that I do not wish to begin all over again with another one. Also, do not insist too strongly on my desire to write a love-story, but put it to her that when I plan out work of course I want to do the work as I have planned it. Try to keep these important points in your mind; then you can urge common sense upon her as much as you please."

I sent a note to my grandmother saying that I should not be home to luncheon, and after having taken a bite at the inn I set out for a long walk. It was simply impossible for me to talk about common things until this matter was settled.

It was about the middle of the afternoon when I returned to the inn, and Walkirk had not come back. I went away again, took a turn through the woods, and on approaching the inn I saw him walking down the shady road which led from the House of Martha. I hurried to meet him.

So soon as he was near enough, Walkirk, with a beaming face, called out:—

"All right, sir. I have settled that little matter for you."

"How? What?" I exclaimed. "What have you done?"

We had now reached each other, and stood together by the side of the road.

"Well," said my under-study, "I have seen Mother Anastasia, and I have found her a very sensible woman,—an admirable woman, I assure you. She was a good deal surprised when I told her my errand, for that was the first she had heard of the love-story; in fact, I suppose your secretary had not had time to tell her about it. She commended the sister highly for her refusal to write it, saying that her action was in strict accordance with the spirit of their rules. When she had finished saying all she had to say on that point, I presented your side of the question; and I assure you, sir, that I clapped on it a very bright light, so that if she did not see its strong points the fault must be in her own eyes. As the event proved, there was nothing the matter with her eyes. I shall not try to repeat what I said, but I began by explaining to her the nature of your work, and showed her how impossible it was for you to write about foreign countries without referring to their people, and how you could not speak of the people without mentioning their peculiar manners and customs, and that this story was nothing more nor less than an interweaving of some of the characteristics of the people of Sicily with the descriptions of the country. Thus much I inferred from your remarks about the story.

"I persisted that, although such characteristics had no connection with the life of the sisters of the House of Martha, they were a part of the world which you were describing, and that it could be no more harm for a sister, working for wages and the good of the cause, to assist in that description than it would be for one of them to make lace to be worn at a wedding, a ceremony with which the sisters could have nothing to do, and which in connection with themselves they could not even think about. This point made an impression on Mother Anastasia, and, having thought about it a minute or two, she said there was a certain force in it.

"Then she asked me if this narrative of yours was a strongly accentuated love-story. Here she had me at a disadvantage, for I have not heard it; but I assured her that, knowing the scope and purpose of your work, I did not believe that you would accentuate any portion of it more than was absolutely necessary.

"After some silent consideration, Mother Anastasia said she would go and speak with the sister who had been doing your work. She was gone a good while,—at least it seemed so to me; and when she came back she said that she had been making inquiries of the sister, and had come to the conclusion that there was no good reason why the House of Martha should not continue to assist you in the preparation of your book."

"Did she say she would send the same sister?" I asked quickly.

"No, she did not," answered Walkirk; "but not wishing to put the question too pointedly, I first thanked her, on your behalf, for the kindly consideration she had given the matter. I then remarked—without intimating that you said anything about it—that I hoped nothing would occur to retard the progress of the work, and that the present arrangement might continue without changes of any kind, because I knew that when you were dictating your mind was completely absorbed by your mental labors, and that any alteration in your hours of work, or the necessity of explaining your methods to a new amanuensis, annoyed and impeded you. To this she replied it was quite natural you should not desire changes, and that everything should go on as before."

"Walkirk," I exclaimed, "you are a trump!" In my exuberant satisfaction I would have clapped him on the back; but it would not do to be so familiar with an under-study, and besides I did not wish him to understand the extent of my delight at the result of his mission. That sort of thing I liked to keep to myself.



XVIII.

AN ILLEGIBLE WORD.

Every morning there seemed to be some reason or other why I should anticipate with an animated interest the coming of my secretary, and on the morning after what I might call her "strike" the animation of said interest was very apparent to me, but I hope not to any one else. Over and over I said to myself that I must not let my nun see that I was greatly pleased with Walkirk's intervention. It would be wise to take the result as a matter of course.

As the clock struck nine, she and Sister Sarah entered the anteroom, and the latter advanced to the grating and looked into my study, peering from side to side. I did not like this sister's face; she looked as if she had grown unpleasantly plump on watered milk.

"Is it necessary," she asked, "that you should smoke tobacco during your working hours?"

"I never do it," I replied indignantly,—"never!"

"Several times," she said, "I have thought I perceived the smell of tobacco smoke in this sister's garments."

"You are utterly mistaken!" I exclaimed. "During the hours of work these rooms are perfectly free from anything of the sort."

She gave a little grunt and departed, and when she had locked the door I could not restrain a slight ejaculation of annoyance.

"You must not mind Sister Sarah," said the sweet voice of my nun behind the barricade of her bonnet; "she is as mad as hops this morning."

"What is the matter with her?" I asked, my angry feelings disappearing in an instant.

"She and Mother Anastasia have had a long discussion about the message you sent in regard to my keeping on with the story. Sister Sarah is very much opposed to my doing your writing at all."

"Well, as she is not the head of your House, I suppose we need not trouble ourselves about that," I replied. "But how does the arrangement suit you? Are you satisfied to continue to write my little story?"

"Satisfied!" she said. "I am perfectly delighted;" and as she spoke she turned toward me, her eyes sparkling, and her face lighted by the most entrancing smile I ever beheld on the countenance of woman. "This is a thousand times more interesting than anything you have done yet, although I liked the rest very much. Of course I stopped when I supposed it was against our rules to continue; but now that I know it is all right I am—But no matter; let us go on with it. This is what I last wrote," and she read: "'Tomaso and the pretty Lucilla now seated themselves on the rock, by a little spring. He was trying to look into her lovely blue eyes, which were slightly turned away from him and veiled by their long lashes. There was something he must say to her, and he felt he could wait no longer. Gently he took the little hand which lay nearest him, and'—There is where I stopped," she said; and then, her face still bright, but with the smile succeeded by an air of earnest consideration, she asked, "Do you object to suggestions?"

"Not at all," said I; "when they are to the point, they help me."

"Well, then," she said, "I wouldn't have her eyes blue. Italian girls nearly always have black or brown eyes. It is hard to think of this girl as a blonde."

"Oh, but her eyes are blue," I said; "it would not do at all to have them anything else. Some Italian girls are that way. At any rate, I couldn't alter her in my mind."

"Perhaps not," she replied, "but in thinking about her she always seems to me to have black eyes; however, that is a matter of no importance, and I am ready to go on."

Thus, on matters strictly connected with business, my nun and I conversed, and then we went on with our work. I think that from the very beginnings of literature there could have been no author who derived from his labors more absolute pleasure than I derived from mine: never was a story more interesting to tell than the story of Tomaso and Lucilla. It proved to be a very long one, much longer than I had supposed I could make it, and sometimes I felt that it was due to the general character of my book that I should occasionally insert some description of scenery or instances of travel.

My secretary wrote as fast as I could dictate, and sometimes wished, I think, that I would dictate faster. She seldom made comments unless she thought it absolutely necessary to do so, but there were certain twitches and movements of her head and shoulders which might indicate emotions, such as pleasant excitement at the sudden development of the situation, or impatience at my delay in the delivery of interesting passages; and I imagined that during the interpolation of descriptive matter she appeared to be anxious to get through with it as quickly as possible, and to go on with the story.

It was my wish to make my book a very large one; it was therefore desirable to be economical with the material I had left, and to eke it out as much as I could with fiction; but upon considering the matter I became convinced that it could not be very long before the material which in any way could be connected with the story must give out, and that therefore it would have to come to an end. How I wished I had spent more time in Sicily! I would have liked to write a whole book about Sicily.

Of course I might take the lovers to other countries; but I had not planned anything of this kind, and it would require some time to work it out. Now, however, a good idea occurred to me, which would postpone the conclusion of the interesting portion of my work. I would have my secretary read what she had written. This would give me time to think out more of the story, and it is often important that an author should know what he has done before he goes on to do more. We had arrived at a point where the narrative could easily stop for a while; Tomaso having gone on a fishing voyage, and the middle-aged innkeeper, whose union with Lucilla was favored by her mother and the village priest, having departed for Naples to assume the guardianship of two very handsome young women, the daughters of an old friend, recently deceased.

When I communicated to my nun my desire to change her work from writing to reading, she seemed surprised, and asked if there were not danger that I might forget how I intended to end the story. I reassured her on this point, and she appeared to resign herself to the situation.

"Shall I begin with the first page of the manuscript," said she, "or read only what I have written?"

"Oh, begin at the very beginning," I said. "I want to hear it all."

Then she began, hesitating a little at times over the variable chirography of my first amanuensis. I drew up my chair near to the grating, but before she had read two pages I asked her to stop for a moment.

"I think," said I, "it will be impossible for me to get a clear idea of what you are reading unless you turn and speak in my direction. You see, the sides of your bonnet interfere very much with my hearing what you say."

For a few moments she remained in her ordinary position, and then she slowly turned her chair toward me. I am sure she had received instructions against looking into my study, which was filled with objects calculated to attract the attention of an intelligent and cultivated person. Then she read the manuscript, and as she did so I said to myself, over and over again, that for her to read to me was a thousand times more agreeable than for me to dictate to her.

As she read, her eyes were cast down on the pages which she held in her hand; but frequently when I made a correction they were raised to mine, as she endeavored to understand exactly what I wanted her to do. I made a good many alterations which I think improved the work very much.

Once she found it utterly impossible to decipher a certain word of the manuscript. She scrutinized it earnestly, and then, her mind entirely occupied by her desire properly to read the matter, she rose, and came close to the grating, holding the page so that I could see it.

"Can you make out this word?" she asked. "I cannot imagine how any one could write so carelessly."

I sprang to my feet and stood close to the grating. I could not take the paper from her, and it was necessary for her to hold it. I examined the word letter by letter. I gave my opinion of each letter, and I asked her opinion. It was a most illegible word. A good many things interfered with my comprehension of it. Among these were the two hands with which she held up the page, and another was the idea which came to me that in the House of Martha the sisters were fed on violets. I am generally quite apt at deciphering bad writing, but never before had I shown myself so slow and obtuse at this sort of thing.

Suddenly a thought struck me. I glanced at the clock in my study. It wanted ten minutes of twelve.

"It must be," said I, "that that word is intended to be 'heaven-given,'—at any rate, we will make it that; and now I think I will get you to copy the last part of that page. You can do it on the back of the sheet."

She was engaged in this writing when Sister Sarah came in.



XIX.

GRAY ICE.

During the engagement of my present secretary, a question had frequently arisen in my mind, which I wished to have answered, but which I had hesitated to ask, for fear the sister should imagine it indicated too much personal interest in her. This question related to her name, and now it was really necessary for me to know it. I did not wish any longer to speak to her as if she were merely a principle; she had become a most decided entity. However harsh and gray and woolly her name might be, I wanted to know it and to hear it from her own lips. The next morning I asked her what it was.

She was sitting at the table arranging the pages she was going to read, and at the question she turned toward me. Her face was flushed, but not, I think, with displeasure.

"Do you know," she said, "it has seemed to me the funniest thing in the world that you have never cared the least bit to know my name."

"I did care," I replied, "in fact it was awkward not to know it; but of course I did not want to—interfere in any way with the rules of your establishment."

"Ah," she said, "I have noticed your extreme solicitude in regard to our rules, but there is no rule against telling our names. Mine is Sister Hagar."

"Hagar!" I exclaimed. "You do not mean that is your real name?"

"It is the name given me by the House of Martha," she answered. "There is a list of names by which the sisters must be called, and as we enter the institution we take the names in their order on the list. Hagar came to me."

"I shall not call you by that," said I, "and we may as well go on with our work."

I was anxious to have her read, and to forget that she was called Hagar.

She was a long time arranging the manuscript and putting the pages in order. I did not hurry her, but I could not see any reason for so much preparation. Presently she said, still arranging the sheets, and with her head bent slightly over her work: "I don't know whether or not I ought to tell you, but I dislike to be called Hagar. The next name on the list is Rebecca, and I am willing to take that, but the rules of the House do not allow us to skip an unappropriated name, and permit no choosing. However, Mother Anastasia has not pressed the matter, and, although I am entered as Sister Hagar, the sisters do not call me by that name."

"What do they call you?"

"Oh, they simply use the name that was mine before I entered the House of Martha," said she.

"And what is that?" I asked quickly.

"Ah," said my nun, pushing her sheets into a compact pile, and thumping their edges on the table to make them even, "to talk about that would be decidedly against the rules of the institution;—and now I am ready to read."

Thus did she punish me for what she considered my want of curiosity or interest; I knew it as well as if she had told me so. I accepted the rebuff and said no more, and she went on with her reading.

On this and the following day I became aware how infinitely more pleasant it was to listen than to be listened to,—at least under certain circumstances. I considered it wonderfully fortunate to be able to talk to such an admirable listener as Walkirk: but to sit and hear my nun read; to watch the charming play of her mouth, and the occasional flush of a smile when she came to something exciting or humorous; to look into the blue of her eyes, as she raised them to me while I considered an alteration, was to me an overwhelming rapture,—I could call it nothing less. But by the end of the third morning of reading my good sense told me that this sort of thing could not go on, and it would be judicious for me to begin again my dictation, and to let my secretary confine herself to her writing. The fact that on any morning I had not allowed her to read until the hour of noon was an additional proof that my decision was a wise one.

The story of Tomaso and Lucilla now went bravely on, with enough groundwork of foreign land for the characters to stand on, and I tried very hard to keep my mind on the writing of my book and away from its writer. Outwardly I may have appeared to succeed fairly well in this purpose, but inwardly the case was different. However, if I could suppress any manifestations of my emotions, I told myself, I ought to be satisfied.

A few mornings after the recommencement of the dictation I was a little late in entering my study, and I found my secretary already at the table in the anteroom. In answer to my morning salutation she merely bowed, and sat ready for work. She did not even offer to read what she had last written. This surprised me. Was she resenting what she might look upon as undue stiffness and reserve? If so, I was very sorry, but at the same time I would meet her on her own ground. If she chose to return to her old rigidity, I would accept the situation, and be as formal as she liked.

More than this, I began to feel a little resentment. I would revert not only to my former manner, but to my former matter. I would wind up that love-story, and confine myself to the subject of foreign travel.

Acting on this resolution, I made short work of Tomaso and Lucilla. The former determined not to think of marriage until he was several years older, and had acquired the necessary means to support a wife; and Lucilla accepted the advice of her mother and the priest, and obtained a situation in a lace-making establishment in Venice, where she resolved to work industriously until the middle-aged innkeeper had made up his mind whether or not he would marry one of the handsome girls to whom he had become guardian.

To this very prosaic conclusion of the love-story I added some remarks intended as an apology for introducing such a story into my sketches of travel, and showing how the little narrative brought into view some of the characteristics of the people of Sicily. After that I discoursed of the present commerce of Italy as compared with that of the Middle Ages.

My secretary took no notice whatever of my change of subject, but went on writing as I dictated. This apathy at last became so annoying to me that, excusing myself, I left my study before the hour of noon.

It is impossible for me to say how the events, or rather the want of events, of that morning disturbed my mind. By turns I was angry, I was grieved, I was regretful, I was resentful. It is so easy sometimes for one person, with the utmost placidity, to throw another person into a state of mental agitation; and this I think is especially noticeable when the placid party is a woman.

As the day wore on, my disquiet of mind and body and general ill humor did not abate, and, wishing that other people should not notice my unusual state of mind, I took an early afternoon train to the city; leaving a note for Walkirk, informing him that his services as listener would not be needed that evening. The rest of that day I spent at my club, where, fortunately for my mood, I met only a few old fellows who could not get out of town in the summer, and who had learned, from long practice, to be quite sufficient unto themselves. Seated in a corner of the large reading-room, I spent the evening smoking, holding in my hand an unread newspaper, and asking myself mental questions.

I inquired why in the name of common sense I allowed myself to be so disturbed by the conduct of an amanuensis, paid by the day, and, moreover, a member of a religious order. I inquired why the fates should have so ordered it that this perfectly charming young woman should suddenly have become frozen into a mass of gray ice. I inquired if I had inadvertently done or said anything which would naturally wound the feelings or arouse the resentment of a sister of the House of Martha. I inquired if there could be any reasonable excuse for a girl who, on account of an omission or delay in asking her name, would assume a manner of austere rudeness to a gentleman who had always treated her with scrupulous courtesy. Finally I asked myself why it was that I persisted, and persisted, and persisted in thinking about a thing like this, when my judgment told me that I should instantly dismiss the whole affair from my mind, and employ my thoughts on something sensible; and to this I gave the only answer which I made to any of the inquiries I had put to myself. That was that I did not know why this was so, but it was so, and there was no help for it.

Walking home from the station quite late at night, the question which had so much troubled me suddenly resolved itself, and I became convinced that the change in the manner of my secretary was due to increased pressure of the rules of the House of Martha. I would not, I could not, believe that a fit of pique, occasioned by my apparent want of interest in her, could make her thus cold and even rude. She was not the kind of girl to do this thing of her own volition. It was those wretched rules; and if they were to be enforced in this way, the head of the House of Martha should know that I considered the act a positive discourtesy, if nothing more.

I was angry,—that was not to be wondered at; but it was a great relief to me to feel that I need not be angry with my secretary.



XX.

TOMASO AND I.

The next day my amanuensis bade me good-morning in her former pleasant manner, but without turning toward me seated herself quickly at the table, and took the manuscript from the drawer. "Oh, ho!" I thought, "then you can speak; and it was not the rules which made you behave in that way, but your own pique, which has worn off a little." I glanced at her as she intently looked over the work of the day before, and I was considering whether or not it would be fitting for me to show that there might be pique on one side of the grating as well as on the other, when suddenly my thoughts were interrupted by a burst of laughter,—girlish, irrepressible laughter. With the manuscript in her hands, my nun actually leaned back in her chair and laughed so heartily that I wonder my grandmother did not hear her.

"I declare," she said, turning to me, her eyes glistening with tears of merriment, "this is the funniest thing I ever saw. Why, you have actually separated those poor lovers for life, and crushed every hope in the properest way. And then all the rest about commerce! I wouldn't have believed you could do it."

"What do you mean?" I exclaimed. "You showed no surprise when you wrote it."

Again she laughed.

"Wrote it!" she cried. "I never wrote a line of it. It was Sister Sarah who was your secretary yesterday. Didn't you know that?"

I stood for a moment utterly unable to answer; then I gasped, "Sister Sarah wrote for me yesterday! What does it mean?"

"Positively," said she, pushing back her chair and rising to her feet, "this is not only the funniest, but the most wonderful thing in the world. Do you mean truly to say that you did not know it was Sister Sarah who wrote for you yesterday?"

"I did not suspect it for an instant," I answered.

"It was, it was!" she exclaimed, clasping her hands in her earnestness, and stepping closer to the grating. "When we came here yesterday, and found you were not in your room, a sudden idea struck her. 'I will stay here myself, this morning,' she said, 'and do his writing. I want to know what sort of a story this is that is being dictated to a sister of our House;' and so she simply turned me out and told me to go home. You don't know how frightened I was. I was afraid that, as we dress exactly alike, you might not at first notice that Sister Sarah was sitting at the table, and that you might begin with an awfully affectionate speech by Tomaso; for I knew that something of that kind was just on the point of breaking out, and I knew too that if you did it there would be lively times in the House of Martha, and perhaps here also. I fairly shivered the whole morning, and my only hope was that she would begin to snap at you as soon as you came in, and you would then know whom you had to deal with, and that you would have to put a lot of water into your love-making if you wanted any more help from the sisters. But if I had known that you would not find out that she was writing for you, I should certainly have died. I couldn't have stood it. But how in the world could you have kept on thinking that that woman was I? She is shorter and fatter, and not a bit like me, except in her clothes; and if you thought I was writing for you, why did you dictate that ridiculous stuff?"

I stood confounded. Here were answers to devise.

"Of course the dress deceived me," I said presently, "and not once did she turn her face toward me; besides, I did not imagine for a moment that any one but you could be sitting at that table."

"But I cannot understand why," she pursued, "if you didn't know it was Sister Sarah, you made that sudden change in your story."

For a moment I hesitated, and then I saw I might as well speak out honestly. When a man sees before him a pair of blue eyes like those which were then fixed upon me, the chances are that he will speak out honestly.

"The fact is," I said, "that I'm a little—well, sensitive; and when you, or the person I thought was you, did not speak to me, nor look at me, nor pay any more heed to me than if I had been a talking-machine worked with a crank, I was somewhat provoked, and determined that if you suddenly chose to freeze in that way I would freeze too, and that you should have no more of that story in which you were so interested; and so I smashed the loves of Tomaso and Lucilla and took up commerce, which I was sure you would hate."

At this there was a quick flash in her eyes, and the first tremblings of a smile at the corners of her mouth.

"Oh!" she said, and that was all she did say, as she returned to the table and took her seat.

"Is my explanation satisfactory?" I asked.

"Oh, certainly," she answered; "and if you will excuse me for saying so, I think you are a very fortunate man. In trying to punish me you protected yourself,—that is, if you care to have secretaries from our institution."

As I could not see her face, I could not determine what answer I should make to this remark, and she continued, as she turned over the sheets:—

"What are you going to do with the pages which were written yesterday?"

"Tear them up," I replied, "and throw them into the basket. I wish to annihilate them utterly."

She obeyed me, and tore Sister Sarah's work into very small pieces.

"Now we will go on with the original and genuine story," I said. "And as the occurrences of yesterday are entirely banished from my mind, and as all recollection of the point where we left off has gone, will you kindly read two or three pages of what you last wrote?"

Several times I had perceived, or thought I had perceived, symptoms of emotion in the back of my secretary's shawl, and these symptoms, if such they were, were visible now. She occupied some minutes in selecting a suitable point at which to begin, but when she had done this she read without any signs of emotion, either in her shawl or in her face.

The story of the Sicilian young people progressed slowly, not because of any lack of material, but because I was anxious to portray the phases as clearly and as effectively as I could possibly do it; and whenever I could prevent myself from thinking of something else, I applied my mind most earnestly to this object. I flatter myself that I did the work very well, and I am sure there were passages the natural fervor of which would have made Sister Sarah bounce at least a yard from her chair, had they been dictated to her, but my nun did not bounce in the least.

Before the hour at which we usually stopped work I arose from my chair, and stated that that would be all for the day. My secretary looked at me quickly.

"All for to-day?" she asked, a little smile of disapprobation upon her brow. "It cannot be twelve o'clock yet."

"No," I answered, "it is not; but it is not easy to work out the answer which Lucilla ought now to make to Tomaso, and I shall have to take time for its consideration."

"I shouldn't think it would be easy," said she, "but I hoped you had it already in your mind."

"Then you are interested in it?" I asked.

"Of course I am," she answered,—"who wouldn't be? And just at this point, too, when everything depends on what she says; but it is quite right for you to be very careful about what you make her say," and she gathered her sheets together to lay them away.

Now I wanted to say something to her. I stopped work for that purpose, but I did not know what to say. An apology for my conduct of the day before would not be exactly in order, and an explanation of it would be exceedingly difficult. I walked up and down my study, and she continued to arrange her pages. When she had put them into a compact and very neat little pile, she opened the table drawer, placed them in it, examined some other contents of the drawer, and finally closed it, and sat looking out of the window. After some minutes of this silent observation, she half turned toward me, and without entirely removing her gaze from the apple-tree outside, she asked:—

"Do you still want to know my name?"

"Indeed I do!" I exclaimed, stepping quickly to the grating.

"Well, then," she said, "it is Sylvia."

At this moment we heard the footsteps of Sister Sarah in the hall, at least two minutes before the usual time.

When they had gone, I stood by my study table, my arms folded and my eyes fixed upon the floor.

"Horace Vanderley," I said to myself, "you are in love;" and to this frank and explicit statement I answered, quite as frankly, "That is certainly true; there can be no mistake about it."



XXI.

LUCILLA AND I.

A Saturday afternoon, evening, and night, the whole of a Sunday and its night, with some hours of a Monday morning, intervened between the moment at which I had acknowledged to myself my feelings toward my secretary and the moment at which I might expect to see her again, and nearly the whole of this time was occupied by me in endeavoring to determine what should be my next step. To stand still in my present position was absolutely impossible: I must go forward or backward. To go backward was a simple thing enough; it was like turning round and jumping down a precipice; it made me shudder. To go forward was like climbing a precipice with beetling crags and perpendicular walls of ice.

The first of these alternatives did not require any consideration whatever. To the second I gave all the earnest consideration of which I was capable, but I saw no way of getting up. The heights were inaccessible.

In very truth, my case was a hard one. I could not make love to a woman through a grating; and if I could, I would not be dishonorable enough to do it, when that woman was locked up in a room, and could not get away in case she did not wish to listen to my protestations. But between the girl I loved and myself there was a grating compared with which the barrier in the doorway of my study was as a spider's web. This was the network of solemn bars which surrounded the sisters of the House of Martha,—the vows they had made never to think of love, to read of it or speak of it.

To drop metaphors, it would be impossible for me to continue to work with her and conceal my love for her; it would be stupidly useless, and moreover cowardly, to declare that love; and it would be sensible, praiseworthy, and in every way advantageous for me to cease my literary labors and go immediately to the Adirondacks or to Mount Desert. But would I go away on Saturday or Sunday when she was coming on Monday? Not I.

She came on Monday, surrounded by a gray halo, which had begun to grow as beautiful to my vision as the delicate tints of early dawn. When she began to read what she had last written, I seated myself in a chair by the grating. When she had finished, I sat silent for a minute, got up and walked about, came back, sat down, and was silent again. In my whole mind there did not seem to be one crevice into which an available thought concerning my travels could squeeze itself. She sat quietly looking out of the window at the apple-tree. Presently she said:—

"I suppose you find it hard to begin work on Monday morning, after having rested so long. It must be difficult to get yourself again into the proper frame of mind."

"On this Monday morning," I answered, "I find it very hard indeed."

She turned, and for the first time that day fixed her eyes upon me. She did not look well; she was pale.

"I had hoped," she said, with a little smile without any brightness in it, "that you would finish the story of Tomaso and Lucilla; but I don't believe you feel like composing, so how would you like me to read this morning?"

"Nothing could suit me better," I answered; and in my heart I thought that here was an angelic gift, a relief and a joy.

"I will begin," she said, "at the point where I left off reading." She took up a portion of the manuscript, she brought her chair within a yard of the grating, she sat down with her face toward me, and she read. Sometimes she stopped and spoke of what she was reading, now to ask a question, and now to tell something she had seen in the place I described. I said but little. I did not wish to occupy any of that lovely morning with my words,—words which were bound to mean nothing. As she read and talked, some color came into her face; she looked more like herself. What a shame to shut up such a woman in a House where she never had anything interesting to talk about, never anybody interested to talk to!

After the reading of half a dozen pages during which she had not interrupted herself, she laid the manuscript in her lap, and asked me the time. I told her it wanted twenty minutes of twelve. She made no answer, but rose, put the manuscript in the drawer, and then returned with a little note which she had taken from her pocket.

"Mother Anastasia desired me to give you this," she said, folding it so that she could push it through one of the interstices of the grating; "she told me to hand it to you as I was coming away, but I don't think she would object to your reading it a little before that."

I took the note, unfolded it, and read it. Mother Anastasia wrote an excellent hand. She informed me that it had been decided that the sister of the House of Martha who had been acting as my amanuensis should not continue in that position, but should now devote herself to another class of work. If, however, I desired it, another sister would take her place.

I stood unable to speak. I must have been as pale as the white paint on the door-frame near which I stood.

"You see," said Sylvia, and from the expression upon her face I think she must have perceived that I did not like what I had read, "this is the work of Sister Sarah. I might as well tell you that at once, and I am sure there is no harm in my doing so. She has always objected to my writing for you; and although the morning she spent with you would have satisfied any reasonable person that there could be no possible objection to my doing it, she has not ceased to insist that I shall give it up, and go to the Measles Refuge. That, however, I will not do, but I cannot come here any more. Mother Anastasia and I are both sure that if I am not withdrawn from this work she will make no end of trouble. She has consented that I should go on until now simply because this day ends my month."

I was filled with amazement, grief, and rage.

"The horrible wretch!" I exclaimed. "What malignant wickedness!"

"Oh," said Sylvia, holding up one finger, "you mustn't talk like that about the sister. She may think she is right, but I don't see how she can; and perhaps she would have some reason on her side if she could see me standing here talking about her, instead of attending to my work. But I determined that I would not go away without saying a word. You have always been very courteous to us, and I don't see why we should not be courteous to you."

"Are you sorry to go?" I asked, getting as close to the grating as I could. "If they would let you, would you go on writing for me?"

"I should be glad to go on with the work," she said; "it is just what I like."

"Too bad, too bad!" I cried. "Cannot it be prevented? Cannot I see somebody? You do not know how much I—how exactly you"—

"Excuse me," said Sylvia, "for interrupting you, but what time is it?"

I glanced at the clock. "It wants four minutes of twelve," I gasped.

"Then I must bid you good-by," she said.

"Good-by?" I repeated. "How can you bid me good-by? Confound this grating! Isn't that door open?"

"No," she replied, "it's locked. Do you want to shake hands with me?"

"Of course I do!" I cried. "Good-by like this! It cannot be."

"I think," she said quickly, "that if you could get out of your window, you might come to mine and shake hands."

What a scintillating inspiration! What a girl! I had not thought of it! In a moment I had bounded out of my window, and was standing under hers, which was not four feet from the ground. There she was, with her beautiful white hand already extended. I seized it in both of mine.

"Oh, Sylvia," I said, "I cannot have you go in this way. I want to tell you—I want to tell you how"—

"You are very good," she interrupted, endeavoring slightly to withdraw her hand, "and when the story of Tomaso and Lucilla is finished and printed I am going to read it, rules or no rules."

"It shall never be finished," I exclaimed vehemently, "if you do not write it," and, lifting her hand, I really believe I was about to kiss it, when with a quick movement she drew it from me.

"She is coming," she said; "good-by! good-by!" and with a wave of her hand she was gone from the window.

I did not return to my study. I stood by the side of the house, with my fists clenched and my eyes set. Then, suddenly, I ran to the garden wall; looking over it, I saw, far down the shaded village street, two gray figures walking away.



XXII.

I CLOSE MY BOOK.

By the rarest good fortune my grandmother started that afternoon for a visit to an old friend at the seashore, and, in the mild excitement of her departure, I do not think she noticed anything unusual in my demeanor.

"And so your amanuensis has left you?" she remarked, as she was eating a hasty luncheon. "Sister Sarah stopped for a moment and told me so. She said there was another one ready to take the place, if you wanted her."

I tried to suppress my feelings, but I must have spoken sharply.

"Want her!" I exclaimed. "I want none of her!"

My grandmother looked at me for a moment.

"I shall be sorry, Horace," she said, "if you find that the sisters do not work to suit you. I hoped that you might continue to employ them, because the House of Martha is at such a convenient distance, and offers you such a variety of assistance to choose from; and also because you would contribute to a most worthy cause. You know that all the money they may make is to go to hospitals and that sort of thing."

"I was a little afraid, however," she continued, after a pause, "that the sister you engaged might not suit you. She was so much younger than the others that I feared that, away from the restraints of the institution, she might be a little frivolous. Was she ever frivolous?"

"Not in the least," I answered; "not for an instant."

"I am very glad to hear that," she remarked,—"very glad indeed. I take an interest in that sister. Years ago I knew her family, but that was before she was born. I remember that I was intending to speak to you about her, but in some way I was interrupted."

"Well," I asked, "tell me now, who is she?"

"She is," said my grandmother, "Sister Hagar, of the House of Martha. She was Sylvia Raynor, of New Haven. I think that in some way her life has been darkened. Mother Anastasia takes a great interest in her, and favors her a good deal. I know there was opposition to her entering the House, but she was determined to do it. You say you are not going to engage another sister? Who is to be your amanuensis?"

"No one," I answered. "I shall stop writing for the present. This is a very good time. I've nearly reached the end of—a sort of division of the book."

"An excellent idea," said my grandmother, with animation. "You ought to go to the sea or the mountains. You have been working very hard. You are not looking well."

"I shall go, I shall go," I answered quickly; "fishing, probably, but I can't say where. I'll write to you as soon as I decide."

"Now that is very pleasant," said my grandmother, as she rose from the table, "very pleasant indeed; and if you write that you will be away fishing for a week or two, I shall stay at the Bromleys' longer than I intended,—perhaps until you return."

"A week or two!" I muttered to myself.

Walkirk had sharper eyes than those of my grandmother. I am sure that when he came that evening he saw immediately that something was the matter with me,—something of moment. He was a man of too much tact to allude to my state of mind; but in a very short time I saved him all the trouble of circumspection, for I growled out that I could not talk about travels at present, and then told him that I could not write about them, either, for I had lost my secretary. His countenance exhibited much concern.

"But you can get another of the sisters," he said.

What I replied to this I do not remember, but I know I expressed myself so freely, so explicitly, and with such force that Walkirk understood very well that I wanted the secretary I had lost, that I wanted none other, and that I wanted her very much indeed. In fact, he comprehended the situation perfectly.

I was not sorry. I wanted somebody to whom I could talk about the matter, in whom I could confide. In ten minutes I was speaking to Walkirk in perfect confidence.

"But you can't do anything," said he, when there came a pause. "This is a case in which there is nothing to do. My advice is that you go away for a time, and try to get over it."

"I am going away," I replied.

"You could do nothing better," Walkirk remarked. "I am altogether in favor of that, although of course such counsel is against my own interests."

"Not at all," said I, catching his meaning, "for I shall take you with me."

After a considerable pause in the conversation Walkirk inquired if I had decided where I would go.

"No," I answered, "that is your affair. My desire is to get away from every place where there is any chance of seeing a woman. I wish to obliterate from my mind all idea of the female human being. In fact, I think I should like to take lodgings near a monastery, and have the monks come and write for me,—a different one every day."

Walkirk smiled. "Since you wish me to select your retreat," he said, "I am bound to have an opinion regarding it. I might advise a visit to the Trappists of Kentucky, or to some remote fishing and hunting region; but it strikes me that a background made up of exclusive association with men would be very apt to bring out in strong relief any particular female image which you might have in your mind. I should say that the best way of getting rid of such an image would be to merge it in a lot of other female images."

"Away with the idea!" I cried. "Walkirk, I will neither merge nor relieve. I will go with you to some place where we shall see neither men nor women; where we can hunt, fish, sail, sleep, read, smoke, and banish the world. I don't wish you to take a servant. We can do without service, and if necessary I can cook. I put the whole matter in your hands, Walkirk, and when you have decided on our destination let me know."

The next afternoon Walkirk found me at my club in the city, and informed me that he had selected a place which he thought would suit my purposes.

"No people?" I asked.

"None but ourselves," replied he.

"Very good," said I. "When can we start?"

"I shall be ready to-morrow afternoon," he answered, "and I will call for you at your house."



XXIII.

RACKET ISLAND.

We traveled all night, and early in the morning alighted at a small station, on the shore of a broad bay. Here we found moored a cat-rigged sailboat, of which Walkirk took possession, and we stowed therein the valises, guns, and fishing tackle which we had brought with us. I examined the craft with considerable interest. It was about twenty feet long, had a small cabin divided into two compartments, and appeared to be well stocked with provisions and other necessaries.

"Is it to be a long cruise?" I said to Walkirk; "and do you know how to sail a boat?"

"With this wind," he answered, "we should reach our destination in a couple of hours, and I consider myself a very fair skipper."

"Up sail, then," I cried, "and I am not in the least hurry to know where I am going."

Walkirk sailed a boat very well, but he did it in rather an odd way, as if he had learned it all out of a book, and never had handled a tiller before. I am not a bad amateur sailor myself, but I gave no consideration to the management of our craft. Walkirk had said that he knew where he was going, and was able to sail there, and I left the matter entirely to him; and whether or not this were his first essay in sailing, in due time we ran upon a low beach, and he exclaimed:—

"Here we are!"

I rose to my feet and looked about me. "Now, then," said I, "I shall ask you, where are we?"

"This is Racket Island," he replied, "and as soon as we get the boat pulled up and the sail down I will tell you about it."

"Racket Island," said Walkirk, a short time afterwards, as we stood together on a little sandy bluff, "was discovered two years ago by me and a friend, as we were sailing about in this bay. I suppose other people may have discovered it before, but as I have seen no proof of this I am not bound to believe it. We named it Racket Island, having found on the beach an old tennis racket, which had been washed there by the waves from no one knows where. The island is not more than half a mile long, with a very irregular coast. The other end of it, you see, is pretty well wooded. We stayed here for three days, sleeping in our boat; and so far as solitude is concerned, we might as well have been on a desert island in the midst of the Pacific. Now I propose that we do the same thing, and stay for three days, or three weeks, or as long as you please. This is the finest season of the year for camping out, and we can moor the boat securely, and cook and sleep on board of it. There is plenty of sand and there is plenty of shade, and I hope you will like it."

"I do!" I cried. "On Racket Island let us settle!"

For two days I experienced a sort of negative enjoyment. If I could not be at home dictating to my late secretary, or, better still, looking at her, as she sat close to the grating, reading to me, this was the next best thing I could do. I could walk over the island; I could sail around it; I could watch Walkirk fish; I could lie on the sand, and look at the sky; and I could picture Sylvia with her hair properly arranged, and attired in apparel suited to her. In my fancy I totally discarded the gray garb of the sisters of the House of Martha, and dressed my nun sometimes in a light summer robe, with a broad hat shading her face, and again in the richest costumes of silks and furs. Sometimes Walkirk interrupted these pleasant reveries, but that, of course, was to be expected.

In several directions we could see points of land, but it did not interest me to know what these were, or how far away they were. Walkirk and I had Racket Island to ourselves. My grandmother was happy with her friends, and where the rest of the world happened to stow themselves I did not care. Several times I said this to myself, but it was a mistake. I cared very much where Sylvia stowed herself. Philosophize as I might, I thought of her continually in that doleful House of Martha; and as I thought of her there I cried out against the shortcomings of civilization.

We had pitched a small tent in the shelter of a clump of trees on the higher part of the island; and near this, on the morning of our third day, I was sitting, smoking, and trying the effect of Sylvia's face under a wide black hat heavy with ostrich plumes, when Walkirk approached me, carrying a string of freshly caught fish.

"I am sorry to say," said he, "that in coming here to escape the society of women we have made a failure, for one of them is sitting on the beach, on the other side of the island."

I sprang to my feet with an abrupt exclamation.

"How did the woman get here?" I cried. "I thought this place was deserted."

"It is; I know every inch of it. No one lives here, but this female person came in a small sailboat. I saw it tied up, not far from where she is sitting."