He clambered down the side of the bluff, and Bartley started to his feet in guilty alarm when he saw him approach. “What's the matter?” “Nothing. But I think you had better help Mrs. Hubbard down the bluff.” “Oh!” cried Mrs. Macallister. “A panic! how interesting!” Halleck did not respond. He threw himself on the grass, and left her to change or pursue the subject as she liked. Bartley showed more _savoir-faire_ when he came back with Marcia, after an absence long enough to let her remove the traces of her tears. “Pretty rough on your game foot, Halleck. But Marcia had got it into her head that it wasn't safe to trust you to help her down, even after you had helped her up.” “Ben,” said Olive, when they were seated in the train the next day, “why _did_ you send Marcia's husband up there to her?” She had the effect of not having rested till she could ask him. “She was crying,” he answered. “What do you suppose could have been the matter?” “What you do: she was miserable about his coquetting with that woman.” “Yes. I could see that she hated terribly to have her come; and that she felt put down by her all the time. What kind of person _is_ Mrs. Macallister?” “Oh, a fool,” replied Halleck. “All flirts are fools.” “I think she's more wicked than foolish.” “Oh, no, flirts are better than they seem,--perhaps because men are better than flirts think. But they make misery just the same.” “Yes,” sighed Olive. “Poor Marcia, poor Marcia! But I suppose that, if it were not Mrs. Macallister, it would be some one else.” “Given Bartley Hubbard,--yes.” “And given Marcia. Well,--I don't like being mixed up with other people's unhappiness, Ben. It's dangerous.” “I don't like it either. But you can't very well keep out of people's unhappiness in this world.” “No,” assented Olive, ruefully. The talk fell, and Halleck attempted to read a newspaper, while Olive looked out of the window. She presently turned to him. “Did you ever fancy any resemblance between Mrs. Hubbard and the photograph of that girl we used to joke about,--your lost love?” “Yes,” said Halleck. “What's become of it,--the photograph? I can't find it any more; I wanted to show it to her one day.” “I destroyed it. I burnt it the first evening after I had met Mrs. Hubbard. It seemed to me that it wasn't right to keep it.” “Why, you don't think it was _her_ photograph!” “I think it was,” said Halleck. He took up his paper again, and read on till they left the cars. That evening, when Halleck came to his sister's room to bid her good night, she threw her arms round his neck, and kissed his plain, common face, in which she saw a heavenly beauty. “Ben, dear,” she said, “if you don't turn out the happiest man in the world, I shall say there's no use in being good!” “Perhaps you'd better say that after all I wasn't good,” he suggested, with a melancholy smile. “I shall know better,” she retorted. “Why, what's the matter, now?” “Nothing. I was only thinking. Good night!”