"I--I heard your voice; ... I wanted to speak to you--to hear you speak to me," she said. A new timidity came into her tone; she raised her head. "I--somehow when you spoke--I felt that you--you were honest." She stammered again, but Lansing's cool voice brought her out of her difficulty and painful shyness. "What is your name?" she asked. "I'm Dr. Lansing," he said. "Will you open my steel box and read my papers for me?" she inquired, innocently. "I will--if you wish," he said, impulsively; "if you think it wise. But I think you had better read the papers for yourself." "Why, I can't read," she said, apparently surprised that he should not know it. "You mean that you were not taught to read in your convent school?" he asked, incredulously. A curious little sound escaped her lips; she raised both slender hands and unpinned her hat. Then she turned her head to his. The deep-blue beauty of her eyes thrilled him; then he started and leaned forward, closer, closer to her exquisite face. "My child," he cried, softly, "my poor child!" And she smiled and fingered the straw hat in her lap. "Will you read my father's papers for me?" she said. "Yes--yes--if you wish. Yes, indeed!" After a moment he said: "How long have you been blind?" IV That evening, at dusk, Lansing came into the club, and went directly to his room. He carried a small, shabby satchel; and when he had locked his door he opened the satchel and drew from it a flat steel box. For half an hour he sat by his open window in the quiet starlight, considering the box, turning it over and over in his hands. At length he opened his trunk, placed the box inside, locked the trunk, and noiselessly left the room. He encountered Coursay in the hall, and started to pass him with an abstracted nod, then changed his mind and slipped his arm through the arm of his young kinsman. "Thought you meant to cut me," said Coursay, half laughing, half in earnest. "Why?" Lansing stopped short; then, "Oh, because you played the fool with Agatha in the canoe? You two will find yourselves in a crankier craft than that if you don't look sharp." "You have an ugly way of putting it," began Coursay. But Lansing scowled and said: "Jack, I want advice; I'm troubled, old chap. Come into my room while I dress for dinner. Don't shy and stand on your hind-legs; it's not about Agatha Sprowl; it's about me, and I'm in trouble." The appeal flattered and touched Coursay, who had never expected that he, a weak and spineless back-slider, could possibly be of aid or comfort to his self-sufficient and celebrated cousin, Dr. Lansing. They entered Lansing's rooms; Coursay helped himself to some cognac, and smoked, waiting for Lansing to emerge from his dressing-room. Presently, bathed, shaved, and in his shirt-sleeves, Lansing came in, tying his tie, a cigarette unlighted between his teeth.