Nothing less than a conviction of this could have made her after an instant add: "What in the world, Mr.Van, are you afraid of ?" Well, that it WAS the right tone a single little minute was sufficient to prove--a minute, I must yet haste to say, big enough in spite of its smallness to contain the longest look on any occasion exchanged between these friends.

It was one of those looks--not so frequent, it must be admitted, as the muse of history, dealing at best in short cuts, is often by the conditions of her trade reduced to representing them--which after they have come and gone are felt not only to have changed relations but absolutely to have cleared the air.

It certainly helped Vanderbank to find his answer.

"I'm only afraid, I think, of your conscience." He had been indeed for the space more helped than she.

"My conscience ?" "Think it over--quite at your leisure--and some day you'll understand.
There's no hurry," he continued--"no hurry.