“But how, monsieur? and would you not first see my tongue?” and she put out the tip of a supremely pink organ. “It is as red as a capsicum,” said Ned. Pamela burst out laughing. She sat up, her cheeks flushed, her brown hair ruffled on her forehead. “Oh!” she cried, “you do not say pretty things at all; you are not like Mr Sherree-den.” “No,” said the young man sadly. “And because I have not his readiness, I must lack his good fortune. Is that the moral of it? But I could be a willing pupil if you would be my tutor.” “Is it so? I should punish and punish till you wearied of me. Say, then, like Mr Sherree-den, ‘Oh, _mon bonté-moi_!’ (he does not, you know, speak varee good French); ‘but here is a poor little sick fairy crumpled in a rose petal.’ _Hélas_! you could not have said that, you solemn man.” “I could not, indeed; but I should have taken the poor little sick fairy and nursed her upon my heart.” She looked up at him kindlily and, suddenly, pathetically-- “But I am not sick at all,” she said, “and you must not take my play to your heart.” Thereat, foolish Ned, reading her words literally, missed his small chance. “I never did,” he only answered stoutly. “I knew you were not asleep.” Mademoiselle pouted. “I do not act so badly, nevertheless,” she said, “when I may have an appreciative audience.” “And I, at least, am that.” She shrugged her shoulders, yawned a tiny yawn. “Well,” she said, “I must not keep monsieur from his business; and monsieur the doctor shall not persuade me to cure too much cake with more.” She rose, smoothing her rumpled plumes. Ned smiled. “I will not, since you bid me, take it to heart,” he said. “Had you found me as heavy as you say, you would not last night have voluntarily elected to bear so much of the weight of my company.” “I sacrificed myself, monsieur, according to my principles, to the good of the community.” “Pamela,” cried my lord, suddenly pained, “my business is to go on a journey only for the reason that I may serve you!” She would have resented, without any real feeling of resentment, his familiar use of her name, had not his tone found the sympathetic chord in her that his words could not reach. “Has madame asked you, then?” she said, with some wonder, some gentleness, in her voice. “I have resolved to offer myself, if you will give me the one end of a clue of hope to bear along with me.” “Of what hope, monsieur? Your bargain should be with madame, not with me.” He would not take her by storm, the aggravating noodle. No doubt that erst fulsome experience of his had distorted his sense of proportion in such matters. “’Tis no bargain, of course,” he cried, in great distress. “To give me hope is to hand me nothing but a promissory note without a signature. But I would kiss it none the less for the sake of the name that might be there.” But why did he not kiss the jade herself?