“He told you! He’s sane enough to know what he does, then, and to talk about it afterwards? Do _you_ believe that he is really incurable?” “Well, he’s pretty bad sometimes,” answered he, not giving a direct answer. “Perhaps you haven’t heard the way he cries out, and the odd noises he makes, miss?” Chris gave a little shudder. “Yes; and it’s very dreadful to hear him. But----” She paused, and looked at the sky, which, now darkening a little towards evening, could be seen between the bare branches of the trees. Stelfox was silent too, but it suddenly flashed through the mind of Chris that his was a discreet silence which had meaning in it. Before either spoke again, Stelfox lifted the lid of the box-ottoman near which he was standing, and rapidly but very quietly slipped inside the two books he had been carrying, and was immediately in the same attitude of respectful attention as before. Then for the first time she heard the creaking of a stair, and, turning her head, she saw Mr. Bradfield approaching. To her great delight, for she had begun on the instant to dread a _tête-à-tête_ with him, Mr. Bradfield scowled as he caught sight of her, and disappeared into a sort of workshop he had on the first floor, where he often spent the afternoon busy with a turning-lathe. As soon as his master was out of sight, Stelfox took the two books out of the ottoman. Chris watched him in evident surprise. Then a thought struck her. “You were going to take those books to Mr. Richard?” she asked, in a low voice. “Yes, miss.” “And you were afraid he wouldn’t like you to?” “Well, miss,” said Stelfox, again with the contortion he meant for a smile, “Mr. Bradfield don’t understand his ways as well as I do, and he thinks books wouldn’t be safe with him. But I know when to trust him with ’em, and he’s as quiet as a lamb this afternoon.” He was going on towards Mr. Richard’s room, when the young lady detained him, saying, in a low voice: “Did he say, Stelfox, that he really meant to hurt me, this morning?” Stelfox looked down at the carpet, and, for a moment, made no answer. Then he looked up, and caught a look of suspense and impatience on her face. Looking down again at once, he said, drily: “No, miss; I don’t recollect as he told me that.” Then he withdrew, leaving the young lady in a state of curiosity and strange excitement. Why should she care whether this poor lunatic wanted to hurt her or not? Surely the only thing that concerned her was that it should be out of his power to do so. This was what Chris told herself. But her girlish sense of romance was tickled by the whole story--by the knowledge of the solitary and sad life this man was leading, close to his fellow-creatures, and yet shut out from them; by a remembrance of the incident of the miniature, which would have passed for his portrait, and yet which surely could not be his; above all by the man himself, with his handsome face and weary eyes.