Something came, in a way which I had not by any means expected. I had told Suan Isco how glad I was that Firm had fixed his liking steadily upon Miss Sylvester. If any woman on earth could be trusted not to say a thing again, that one was this good Indian. Not only because of her provident habits, but also in right of the difficulty which encompassed her in our language. But she managed to get over both of these, and to let Mr. Ephraim know, as cleverly as if she had lived in drawing-rooms, whatever I had said about him. She did it for the best; but it put him in a rage, which he came at once to have out with me. “And so, Miss Erema,” he said, throwing down his hat upon the table of the little parlor, where I sat with an old book of Norman ballads, “I have your best wishes, then, have I, for a happy marriage with Miss Sylvester?” I was greatly surprised at the tone of his voice, while the flush on his cheeks and the flash of his eyes, and even his quick heavy tread, showed plainly that his mind was a little out of balance. He deserved it, however, and I could not grieve. “You have my best wishes,” I replied, demurely, “for any state of life to which you may be called. You could scarcely expect any less of me than that.” “How kind you are! But do you really wish that I should marry old Sylvester's girl?” Firm, as he asked this question, looked so bitterly reproachful (as if he were saying, “Do you wish to see me hanged?”), while his eyes took a form which reminded me so of the Sawyer in a furious puzzle, that it was impossible for me to answer as lightly as I meant to do. “No, I can not say, Firm, that I wish it at all; unless your heart is set on it--” “Don't you know, then, where my heart is set?” he asked me, in a deep voice, coming nearer, and taking the ballad-book from my hands. “Why will you feign not to know, Erema, who is the only one I can ever think of twice? Above me, I know, in every possible way--birth and education and mind and appearance, and now far above me in money as well. But what are all these things? Try to think if only you could like me. Liking gets over every thing, and without it nothing is any thing. Why do I like you so, Erema? Is it because of your birth, and teaching, and manners, and sweet looks, and all that, or even because of your troubles?” “How can I tell, Firm--how can I tell? Perhaps it is just because of myself. And why do you do it at all, Firm?” “Ah, why do I do it? How I wish I knew! Perhaps then I might cure it. To begin with, what is there, after all, so very wonderful about you?” “Oh, nothing, I should hope. Most surely nothing. It would grieve me to be at all wonderful. That I leave for American ladies.” “Now you don't understand me. I mean, of course, that you are wonderfully good and kind and clever; and your eyes, I am sure, and your lips and smile, and all your other features--there is nothing about them that can be called any thing else but wonderful.”