"He can smell them. He loves flowers. His life has not narrowed since he became blind. I think, on the contrary, it has widened." "You are very fond of him, are you not?" "He is a man in a thousand," was the quick reply. "I have reason to be grateful to him, for I was at my wits' end—I was one of those discharged soldiers after the war—incapable of continuing in the army, and I could do nothing else. He heard of me by chance, and took me in straight away. And every day the post is the medium of bringing relief to hundreds of others like myself, and every one he helps, he takes into his life. His purpose in it all is a great one, but he never talks about it." "I think," said Gentian slowly, "that he makes every one he knows better, doesn't he? He makes them good, like himself." "He tries to, at all events," the young secretary said. Gentian rejoined Sir Gilbert in a thoughtful frame of mind. He talked with her about her music, made her a present of a volume of short organ voluntaries, and wanted her to try his organ, but this she declined to do. "I could not play this afternoon," she said. "I have been listening to you, and your music and your talk is filling all my thoughts." On their way home she told Mrs. Wharnecliffe that she was sure that Sir Gilbert would not live very long. "He is too good to live," she asserted. "I have seen women who are good, but not men. Men leave religion to women—unless they are monks or clergymen. Sir Gilbert spends his days in pleasing God. People in the world don't do that unless they are going to die." "Oh, my dear child," said Mrs. Wharnecliffe, smiling; "sometimes I wonder if you are six or sixty. Sir Gilbert is a very ordinary English gentleman. People call him a philanthropist, for he is very interested in all things that help and benefit young people. And he has a wonderful personal influence over them. There are many good men in the world, I'm glad to say, though you may not have met them. Goodness is not confined to dying men." Gentian was silent. She was very quiet for the rest of that day, but the next morning seemed quite to have recovered her usual high spirits. Two days afterwards, Jim arrived. Mrs. Wharnecliffe liked the look of him. She was amused at the determination on his part to be a big unit in Gentian's life, and at her proud aloofness and determination that he should keep his distance, and only have what she chose to give him. He swept away at once all idea of Gentian assuming the profession of chauffeur. "It is ridiculous, and impossible, and out of the question. You must come and stay with us, and my mother will show you why it is the last calling in the world for you." "But I do not know your mother," said Gentian slowly, "and her views and mine might be very far apart." Jim was a tall, muscular young fellow. Be towered over Gentian now, like some great Saxon giant.