They spoil my music.
They hurt me, somehow, all over." Conrad Lagrange received her words with mingled emotions--with pleased delight at her ingenuous frankness; with bitter shame, sorrow, and humiliation and, at the last, with genuine gladness and relief.

"I knew it"-- he said triumphantly--"I knew it.

It was because of my books that you were so afraid of me ?" He asked eagerly, as one would ask to have a deep conviction verified.
"You see," she said,--smiling at the manner of his words,--"I did not know that an author _could_ be so different from the things he writes about." Then, with a puzzled air--"But why do you write the horrid things that spoil my music and make me afraid?
Why don't you write as you talk--about--about the mountains?
Why don't you make books like--like"-- she seemed to be searching for a word, and smiled with pleasure when she found it--"like yourself ?" "Listen"-- said the novelist impressively, taking refuge in his fanciful humor--"listen--I'll tell you a secret that must always be for just you and me--you like secrets don't you ?"--anxiously.
She laughed with pleasure--responding instantly to his mood.

"Of course I like secrets." He nodded approval.

"I was sure you did.