"I assure you," said Vernon, with the fervour of a man lighting on an actual truth in his conversation with a young lady, "it's not the first time I have thought you would be at home in the Alps. You would walk and climb as well as you dance." She liked to hear Clara Middleton talked of, and of her having been thought of, and giving him friendly eyes, barely noticing that he was in a glow, she said: "If you speak so encouragingly I shall fancy we are near an ascent." "I wish we were," said he. "We can realize it by dwelling on it, don't you think?" "We can begin climbing." "Oh!" she squeezed herself shadowily. "Which mountain shall it be?" said Vernon, in the right real earnest tone. Miss Middleton suggested a lady's mountain first, for a trial. "And then, if you think well enough of me--if I have not stumbled more than twice, or asked more than ten times how far it is from the top, I should like to be promoted to scale a giant." They went up to some of the lesser heights of Switzerland and Styria, and settled in South Tyrol, the young lady preferring this district for the strenuous exercise of her climbing powers because she loved Italian colour; and it seemed an exceedingly good reason to the genial imagination she had awakened in Mr. Whitford. "Though," said he, abruptly, "you are not so much Italian as French." She hoped she was English, she remarked. "Of course you are English; . . . yes." He moderated his ascent with the halting affirmative. She inquired wonderingly why he spoke in apparent hesitation. "Well, you have French feet, for example: French wits, French impatience," he lowered his voice, "and charm" "And love of compliments." "Possibly. I was not conscious of paying them" "And a disposition to rebel?" "To challenge authority, at least." "That is a dreadful character." "At all events, it is a character." "Fit for an Alpine comrade?" "For the best of comrades anywhere." "It is not a piece of drawing-room sculpture: that is the most one can say for it!" she dropped a dramatic sigh. Had he been willing she would have continued the theme, for the pleasure a poor creature long gnawing her sensations finds in seeing herself from the outside. It fell away. After a silence, she could not renew it; and he was evidently indifferent, having to his own satisfaction dissected and stamped her a foreigner. With it passed her holiday. She had forgotten Sir Willoughby: she remembered him and said. "You knew Miss Durham, Mr. Whitford?" He answered briefly, "I did." "Was she? . . ." some hot-faced inquiry peered forth and withdrew. "Very handsome," said Vernon. "English?" "Yes; the dashing style of English." "Very courageous." "I dare say she had a kind of courage." "She did very wrong." "I won't say no. She discovered a man more of a match with herself; luckily not too late. We're at the mercy . . ." "Was she not unpardonable?" "I should be sorry to think that of any one." "But you agree that she did wrong."