One day, near the first of March, when he had grown able to sit propped up on a sofa by a window, whence he could look out over the broad landscape to where the sky came down to the tufted woods, or turn his eyes upon short silvery bits of the river, he said to her: "I shall soon be able to go away. I feel my strength coming back with every breath." She looked up from the needlework that she chanced just then to have in hand, and, with one of her slow, sweet smiles, shook her head. "You must not begin to hurry. You must be patient, ever so patient. A moment of haste might cause a month of trouble. You can not afford to run any risks." "Oh, I am patient," he replied. "I really find myself dreading to get well, selfish wretch that I am. Do you observe that I never take into consideration the immense trouble I am causing all of you? I think of nothing but the charmed life I am living--the sweet comforts I am receiving." "I really believe you are getting well," she said. "When you talk in that strain I know you are but trying to hide a longing for your mountain air and the freedom of your hermitage." "You do me wrong," he responded, with an earnest resonance in his voice. "I am so content to be as I am that when I go to sleep I do not even dream of being well." "I am glad of it, for the doctor says that a quiet mind is the best salve for a healing wound." "You had better not convince me that the doctor is right, for I might be tempted to get restless in order to prolong my period of delicious convalescence. Beware, if you don't want me lolling in easy chairs or propped on cushions and pillows for you to minister to all the season." "Oh, I shall know it if you begin to take on the air of a professional invalid, and shall discharge you at once," she exclaimed, with a light laugh. "You won't be interesting as a--a sham! I hate shams and deceits and hidden things of every sort." He looked at her with such a sudden, though barely noticeable change of expression in his eyes, that her quick intuition told her of some serious thought that had leaped, unbidden and unwelcome, into his mind. "Hidden things," he said, with a peculiar smile. "Hidden things are often much better hidden than disclosed, and it is a mercy to the world that secretiveness is one of the strongest elements of human nature." "Perhaps so," she said, growing grave and thoughtful. "But it would be so much better if there were never any need to exercise one's secretive faculties." "Oh, a dormant faculty would be contrary to the economy of nature. Even confession catches a precious fragrance from the transgression long hidden away. Conscience would not even be ornamental, much less useful, if it bore no treasure of sins known to it only." He spoke in an airy, idle manner, but there went with his tones a ring of something not quite pleasing.