There was a rustic seat by the path and by a common impulse both moved toward it. At the clubman’s courteous gesture, the cripple, with his unavoidable wrenching jolt, lowered himself painfully to the level of the bench. Mr. Palgrave seated himself beside him, crossed his knees and half turned toward him. He rested his left elbow on the back of the bench. His other hand held his cane, which he tapped against the side of his foot. The waiting carriages, one behind the other, were under a big elm some distance off; their drivers lay on the grass beside them. No one else was in sight except where, rather farther off in another direction, six laborers, their coats off, sat with a superintendent near them, in the shade of a Norway maple, near the Llewellyn monument; which dominated the neighborhood from its low, broad knoll. The brief silence Mr. Palgrave broke. “If you will pardon my saying it, you don’t look at all like my idea of a clairvoyant.” Vargas smiled a wan smile. The tone of the words was totally disarming. “I don’t feel like my idea of a clairvoyant,” he said, “I am usually clear-sighted in any matter I take up; usually so clear-sighted in respect to any personality that my advice, as it often is, seems to my clients a mere echo of their own thoughts, a mere confirmation of their own judgments, a mere additional reason for what they would have done anyhow. I am used to touching unerringly the strongest springs of action. So far I have utterly failed to gain that clue to Mrs. Llewellyn’s character necessary to make my advice acceptable.” “In every other respect you seem to have been as clear-sighted as possible,” Mr. Palgrave told him. “No advice could have been better nor more judiciously urged, nor more entirely disinterested.” “Rather utterly interested,” said Vargas. “In an altogether different sense,” said the other. “She told me. Until I saw you I was astonished that she had not resented it.” “She did resent it, and of course,” said the cripple. “Not as she would from any other man,” said Mr. Palgrave. “There are some things--” Vargas began. His voice thinned out and he broke off. “Yes, I understand,” said her brother, “and I want to say that I feel under much obligation to you for the way you behaved and for the manliness and the straightforwardness of your whole attitude.” “I am greatly complimented,” Vargas replied. “You deserve complimenting,” said Mr. Palgrave. “You acted admirably. Your consideration, I might say your gentleness shows that you really have her best interests at heart.” “I truly have,” said Vargas fervently, “and I am more disturbed in mind than I can express.”