第153章 The Blind God.(4)

Believe me,Miss Mayhew,I not only wish to be an honest friend,but a very considerate one.I promise never to urge you to do anything that will cause you pain.I can understand how the features of your kind friend have touched the tenderest chords of your heart,and I respect your study fidelity to your conscience in refusing to let me paint this bud in your hair;but you must also do me the justice to believe that I meant no hollow compliment when I searched for it among the florists.Must I throw this one away,too?"he asked,with a glance that was very ardent for a friend;"for since I obtained it for you,it must receive its fate at your hands only.""I'll wear it,simply as your gift,with pleasure,"and she fastened it in her breastpin,so that its crimson blush rested against the snowy whiteness of her neck.

He looked her full in the eyes and said,with low,sad emphasis:

"I do not deserve such respect."Then the knowledge that she was harboring a purpose which troubled her conscience,but which she could not abandon,became the cause of a trace of her old recklessness of manner.She assumed a sudden gayety,as if she had stepped out of shadows into too strong a light,as she said:

"Mr.Van Berg,you may well hesitate to bring the appetite you say had last night to our house this evening,and if I stay a moment longer,you will get no dinner at all.I have not been after the crude material--as you call it--yet,and I'm told that there is not a man living so amiable and philosophical,but that a poor dinner provokes martyr-like expression,if nothing worse;"and with a smile and a piquancy of manner that seemed peculiarly brilliant against the background of her deep and repressed feeling,she again left him.