There goes a disappointed man (thought I, as I watched him enter the house). His austerity cloaks some odd experience, I dare swear. Could I but see into his memory I might witness a strange drama being played in that little theatre. Some unconscionable jilt has soured the ripe juices of his nature; and now he spits venom at the whole sex. Yet he makes wry faces over his cynicism. I don't think he relishes it much. He argues, I suppose, that the coming of a wife will prove the going of his occupation. He has a rich young fellow under his charge and has no wish to surrender him to the keeping of a woman. So he directs his forked tongue at her in the hope that I shall be influenced. My little signor, you will be disappointed, if you hope this! He left the house after lunch. At the proper hour I stood at the gate in the fields and peeped over. The garden was empty. I looked at my watch. It was past the time at which I had met her the day before. Twenty minutes passed. I walked to and fro, staring at the windows in the hope of catching a glimpse of her face. Believing she would disappoint me, I grew irritable. "Her conduct," I thought, "is unladylike, to say the least. She promised to meet me, and should come. If she is making a fool of me how will that Martelli exult! But it is my own fault. Am I not an independent man? If I want to marry, have I not but to open my arms to have them filled without the trouble of wooing? For how many women are there who would not cheerfully do all the courting for two thousand pounds a year? Then what do I here, in a hot field, tormented by that accursed gnat" (and here I aimed a prodigious but idle blow at the insect) "worrying my mind with conjectures, a spectacle for the pert eye of the widow's maid, who probably sits watching me from the ambush of a window-curtain?" And I was positively in the act of walking away, when suddenly, from amid a row of lilac trees close to the gate, stepped forth--Mrs. Fraser. "Shall I tell you your thoughts?" she exclaimed, approaching me, without returning my salutation by smile or bow. "If you please," I answered, my mood clearing in her presence as the cloudy heavens clear when the sun shines out. "Stoop your ear then." I inclined my head. She leaned across the gate and whispered, "Mrs. Fraser---- Oh!" she cried, springing back, and clapping her hands, "there are some words that are coarse and burning in the mouth as radishes. This is one. But it's true--and truth must be pungent." "But before I can tell whether it is true or not, let me know what you think." "Don't you think me--a humbug?" "No, no!" I exclaimed with a laugh. "Why do you say no?" with sudden earnestness. "But I may tell you I was annoyed," I continued, "because I feared you would not come."