The fact was, that a certain incongruity in her beloved Lisbeth’s looks and tone, had so frightened Georgie, and touched her susceptible heart, that the tears had rushed to her eyes, and she was filled with a dolorous pity. “You are not--you are not happy,” she cried all at once. “You are not, or you would not speak in that queer, satirical way. I wish you would be a little--a little more--kind, Lisbeth.” Lisbeth’s look was a positively guilty one. “Kind!” she exclaimed. “Kind, Georgie!” Having gone so far, Georgie could not easily draw back, and was fain to go on, though she became conscious that she had placed herself in a very trying position. “It is not kind to keep everything to yourself so closely,” she said, tremulously. “As if we did not care for you, or could not comprehend----” She stopped, because Lisbeth frightened her again. She became so pale, that it was impossible to say anything more. Her great, dark eyes dilated, as if with a kind of horror, at something. “You--you think I have a secret,” she interrupted her, with a hollow-sounding laugh. “And you are determined to make a heroine out of me, instead of allowing me to enjoy my ‘nerves’ in peace. You don’t comprehend ‘nerves,’ that is clear. You are running at a red rag, Georgie, my dear. It is astonishing how prone you good, tender-hearted people are to run at red rags, and toss, and worry them.” It was plain that she would never betray herself. She would hold at arm’s-length even the creature who loved her best, and was most worthy of her confidence. It was useless to try to win her to any revelation of her feelings. Georgie fell to at her packing again, with a very melancholy consciousness of the fact, that she had done no good by losing control over her innocent emotions, and might have done harm. It had pained her inexpressibly to see that quick dread of self-betrayal, which had announced itself in the sudden loss of color, and the odd expression in her friend’s eyes. “She does not love me as I love her,” was her pathetic, mental conclusion. “If she did, she would not be so afraid of me.” When Lisbeth bade her good-by, at the little railway station, the girl’s heart quite failed her. “What shall I say to mamma and papa?” she asked. “Tell them that Pen’yllan agrees with me so well that I don’t like to leave it for the present,” was Lisbeth’s answer. “And tell Mrs. Esmond that I will write to her myself.” “And--” in timid desperation--“and Hector, Lisbeth?” “Hector?” rather sharply. “Why Hector? What has he to do with the matter? But stay!” shrugging her shoulders. “I suppose it would be only civil. Tell him--tell him--that Aunt Clarissa sends her love, and hopes he will take care of his lungs.”