sional character: I look on you now from a professional point of view, and I read, perhaps, all you would conceal—in your eye, which is curiously vivid and restless; in your cheek, which the blood has forsaken; in your hand, which you cannot steady. Come, Lucy, speak and tell me".
"You would laugh"
"If you don't tell me you shall have no more letters".
"You are laughing now".
"I will again take away that single epistle; being mine, I think I have a right to reclaim it".
I felt raillery in his words: it made me grave and quiet, but I folded up the letter and covered it from sight.
"You may hide it, but I can possess it any moment I choose. You don't know my skill in sleight of hand. I might practice as a conjurer if I liked. Mamma says sometimes, too, that I have a harmonizing property of tongue and eye—but you never saw that in me—did you, Lucy?"
"Indeed—indeed—when you were a mere boy I used to see both, far more then than now—for now you are strong, and strength dispenses with subtlety. But still, Dr. John, you have what they call in this country 'un air fin', that nobody can mistake. Madame Beck saw it, and"
"And liked it", said he, laughing, "because she has it herself. But, Lucy, give me that letter—you don't really care for it".
To this provocative speech I made no answer. Graham in mirthful mood must not be humored too far. Just now there was a new sort of smile playing about his lips—very sweet, but it grieved me somehow—a new sort of light sparkling in his eyes, not hostile, but not reassuring. I rose to go—I bid him good-night a little sadly.
His sensitiveness—that peculiar, apprehensive, detective faculty of his—felt in a moment the unspoken complaint—the scarce-thought reproach. He asked quietly if I was offended. I shook my head as implying a negative.
"Permit me, then, to speak a little seriously to you before you go. You are in a highly nervous state. I feel sure from what is apparent in your look and manner, however well-controlled—that whilst alone this evening in that dismal, perishing, sepulchral garret—that dungeon under the leads, smelling of damp and mould, rank with pthisis and catarrh—a place
