"Look here, 'Tana," and Lyster caught her hand again. "I can't let you act like this. They can be of much more help to you socially than all your money. If the family are related to you, and offer you attention, you can't afford to ignore it. You do not realize now how much their attention will mean; but when you are older, you will regret losing it. Let me advise you--let me--" "Oh, hush!" she said, closing her eyes, wearily. "I am tired--tired! What difference does it make to you--why need you care?" "May I tell you?" and he looked at her so strangely, so gravely, that her eyes opened in expectation of--she knew not what. "I did not mean to let you know so soon, 'Tana," and his clasp of her hand grew closer; "but, it is true--I love you. Everything that concerns you makes a difference to me. Now do you understand?" "You!--Max--" "Don't draw your hand away. Surely you guessed--a little? I did not know myself how much I cared till you came so near dying. Then I knew I could not bear to let you go. And--and you care a little too, don't you! Speak to me!" "Let us go home," she answered in a low voice, and tried to draw her fingers away. She liked him--yes; but-- "Tana, won't you speak? Oh, my dear, dear one, when you were so ill, so very ill, you knew no one else, but you turned to me. You went asleep with your cheek against my hand, and more than once, 'Tana, with your hand clasping mine. Surely that was enough to make me hope--for you did like me a little, then." "Yes, I--liked you," but she turned her head away, that he could not see her flushed face. "You were good to me, but I did not know--I could not guess--" and she broke down as though about to cry, and his own eyes were full of tenderness. She appealed to him now as she had never done in her days of brightness and laughter. "Listen to me," he said, pleadingly. "I won't worry you. I know you are too weak and ill to decide yet about your future. I don't ask you to answer me now. Wait. Go to school, as I know you intend to do; but don't forget me. After the school is over you can decide. I will wait with all patience. I would not have told you now, but I wanted you to know I was interested in the answer you would give Haydon. I wanted you to know that I would not for the world advise you, but for your best interests. Won't you believe--" "I believe you; but I don't know what to say to you. You are different from me--your people are different. And of my people you know nothing, nothing at all, and--" "And it makes no difference," he interrupted. "I know you have had a lot of trouble for a little girl, or your family have had trouble you are sensitive about. I don't know what it is, but it makes no difference--not a bit. I will never question about it, unless you prefer to tell of your own accord. Oh, my dear! if some day you could be my wife, I would help you forget all your childish troubles and your unpleasant life."