"Exactly," he assents, in his gently-grim way; "but that only makes it worse. After months of suffering, you allow him to dangle at your heels, you drag him at your chariot wheels, tied him at your apron strings from France to Italy, from Italy to Switzerland, from Switzerland back to France again, and gave him no more encouragement than a cat does a dog." The faint flush is a burning crimson now. "He--he need not come," she murmurs, panting. "He is not obliged." "The moth--the infuriated moth, is not obliged to hover about the candle, but he does hover, and generally winds up by scorching his wings. I admit that it is foolish and unreasonable, but it is none the less true that Leycester is simply incapable, apparently, of resting outside the radius of your presence, and therefore I say hadn't you better give him the right to remain within that radius and----" She put up her hand to stop him, her face a deeper crimson still. "Permit me," he says, obstinately, and puffing at his pipe to emphasize. "Once more the unfortunate wretch is on tenterhooks; he is dying to take possession of you, and afraid to speak up like a man because, possibly, you have had a little illness----" "Oh, uncle, and you said yourself that you thought I should have died." He coughs. "Ahem! One is inclined to exaggerate sometimes. He is afraid to speak because in his utter sensitiveness he will insist upon considering you an invalid still, whereas you are about as strong and healthy now as, to use another Americanism, 'they make 'em.' Now, Stella, if you mean to marry him, say so; if you don't mean to, say so, and for goodness sake let the unfortunate monomaniac go." "Leycester is not a monomaniac, uncle," she retorts, in a low, indignant voice. "Yes, he is," he says, "he is possessed by a mania for a little chit of a girl with a pale face and dark eyes and a nose that is nothing to speak of. If he wasn't an utterly lost maniac he would have refused to dangle at your heels any longer, and gone off to someone with some pretension to a regular facial outline." He stops, for there comes the sound of a firm, manly tread upon the smooth gravel path, and the next instant Leycester's tall figure is beside them. He bends over the slight, slim, graceful figure, a loving, reverential devotion in his handsome face, a faint anxiety in his eyes and in his voice as he says, in that low, musical undertone which has charmed so many women's ears: "Have you no wrap on, Stella? These evenings are very beautiful but treacherous." "There isn't a breath of air," says Stella, with a little laugh. "Yes, yes!" he says, and puts his hand on the arm that rests on the seat, "you must be careful, indeed you must, my darling, I will go and get you a----"