She saw it. "Don't be troubled about me," she said. "I didn't want to die--really, I didn't want to at all. It was only because just at that moment I could not bear it to have you keep asking me when it was impossible,--I felt that I must go away; and apart from you, and Cicely and baby, there seemed no place in the world for me! But now--now I _want_ to live. Perhaps we shall both live long lives." "I'm not a woman, you know," said Paul, with a faint smile. "Women do with make-believes; men can't." She had left him. "Go now," she said. He turned to obey. Then he came back. "Eve, can't you tell me your real reason?" But her face changed so quickly to its old look of agony that he felt a pang of regret that he had spoken. "I will never ask you again," he said. This was the offering he made her--a great one for Paul Tennant. He went away. An hour later she came back to the camp. "Paul has gone to Potterpins," said Hollis, who was sitting by the fire. "Told me to give you this." He handed her a note. It contained but two lines: "I shall come back next week. But send a note by mail; I want to know if you are contented with me." Eve wrote but one word--"Yes." XXV. PAUL remained away for ten days; not by his own wish, but detained by business. During his absence Hollis's services were in demand. Cicely was now able to go out on the lake, and he took her for an hour or two every morning in one of the larger canoes; the nurse and Cicely sat at the bow, then came Porley and Jack, then Eve, then Hollis. Cicely still did not talk, she had not again asked for her grandfather; but she looked at the water and the woods on the shore, and her face showed occasionally some slight childish interest in what was passing. Eve, too, scarcely spoke; but it was pleasure enough for poor Hollis to be opposite to her, where he could see her without appearing to gaze too steadily. He had always admired her; he had admired her voice, her reticent, independent way; he had admired her tall, slender figure, with the broad sweep of the shoulders, the erect carriage, and lithe, strong step. He had never thought her too cold, too pale; but now in the increased life and color which had come to her she seemed to him a daughter of the gods--the strong Northern gods with flaxen hair; the flush in her cheeks made her eyes bluer and her hair more golden; the curve of her lips, a curve which had once been almost sullen, was now strangely sweet. Her love had made her beautiful; her love, too, made her kind to Hollis;--women are often unconsciously cruel in this way. The poor auctioneer lived in a fool's paradise and forgot all his cautions; day-dreams began to visit him, he was a boy again. On the eleventh day Paul returned.