The floor was well-strewn with such chips,--fountains, statues, baths, and all the persons of his little drama,--when papa came in. He held an open letter, and, sitting down, read it over again. Rose fell into silence, clipping the scissors daintily in and out the white sheet through twinkling intricacies. As the design dropped out, I caught it,--a long wreath of honeysuckle-blossoms. Lu was humming a little tune. Rose joined, and hummed the last bars, then bade us good-night. "Yone," said papa, "your Aunt Willoughby is very ill,--will not recover. She is my elder brother's widow; you are her heir. You must go and stay with her." Now it was very likely that just at this time I was going away to nurse Aunt Willoughby! Moreover, illness is my very antipodes,--its nearness is invasion,--we are utterly antipathetic,--it disgusts and repels me. What sympathy can there be between my florid health, my rank, redundant life, and any wasting disease of death? What more hostile than focal concentration and obscure decomposition? You see, we cannot breathe the same atmosphere. I banish the thought of such a thing from my feeling, from my memory. So I said,-- "It's impossible. I'm not going an inch to Aunt Willoughby's. Why, papa, it's more than a hundred miles, and in this weather!" "Oh, the wind has changed." "Then it will be too warm for such a journey." "A new idea, Yone! Too warm for the mountains?" "Yes, papa. I'm not going a step." "Why, Yone, you astonish me! Your sick aunt!" "That's the very thing. If she were well, I might,--perhaps. Sick! What can I do for her? I never go into a sick-room. I hate it. I don't know how to do a thing there. Don't say another word, papa. I can't go." "It is out of the question to let it pass so, my dear. Here you are nursing all the invalids in town, yet"---- "Indeed, I'm not, papa. I don't know and don't care whether they're dead or alive." "Well, then, it's Lu." "Oh, yes, she's hospital-agent for half the country." "Then it is time that you also got a little experience." "Don't, papa! I don't want it. I never saw anybody die, and I never mean to." "Can't I do as well, uncle?" asked Lu. "You, darling? Yes; but it isn't your duty." "I thought, perhaps," she said, "you would rather Yone went." "So I would." "Dear papa, don't vex me! Ask anything else!" "It is so unpleasant to Yone," Lu murmured, "that maybe I had better go. And if you've no objection, Sir, I'll take the early train to-morrow." Wasn't she an angel? * * * * * Lu was away a month. Rose came in, expressing his surprise. I said, "Othello's occupation's gone?" "And left him room for pleasure now," he retorted. "Which means seclusion from the world, in the society of lakes and chromes." "Miss Willoughby," said he, turning and looking directly past me, "may I paint you?" "Me? Oh, you can't." "No; but may I try?" "I cannot go to you." "I will come to you." "Do you suppose it will be like?"