"Yes." She lifted her face. An intensity of expression that he had seen rarely, and always disliked, came over it; the force in her low voice jarred. Why couldn’t she stay pleasant, as she had been there in the crowd. "I would do anything to keep you at home, Philip. Anything, if you would spend your evenings with me; your nights, as you used to." His arm fell. "I thought you understood the outside business would keep me away," he said coolly. "I explained it at the first when you wanted to live here at the mills." She moved a step away. Her heart cried, "It is not the business," but she said aloud, turning to him again with a smile, "A woman doesn’t often reason; she only feels." "That’s the trouble; you feel too much; more than most women. When you are not serious, though, you are a very attractive woman." She stood quite still, with her slender fingers locked, and that intensity growing in her eyes. "Do you know, Philip, sometimes I wonder how you ever could have cared for me; for the best that is in me is what you have overlooked. I should think,"—she paused and forced again that brave little smile,—"I should think that you might be—happier, if you had married a different kind—of woman." At this he laughed. So she was a little jealous, that explained things, and of that flyaway, there in the other room. "There’s the woman one marries," he answered lightly, "and the woman with whom one has a good time; they are seldom alike." She was silent. There is nothing so cuts a proud and refined woman as the enforced knowledge of her husband’s coarser grain; but her disappointment finds no expression; she covers her shame. "But I don’t blame you," he went on, still lightly, "I don’t blame you; I don’t deny you’ve had cause. I’m coming home oftener, after this, though; or, perhaps, before long, I can arrange to take a house in town. You would like that?" "Yes. The loneliness is harder than I believed it could be; it wears on me. And I can’t grow accustomed to the mill people. Last evening I saw a strange face at the window. It haunts me. I woke up in the night time, seeing it. It was—terrible. I have never been a brave woman, Philip. I am—afraid." Her whole body trembled, overcome by the recollection of that face. But Kingsley laughed again. "Well, I don’t wonder. For sheer physical ugliness, this crew Forrest has picked up might, almost to a man, dispute the palm. But Alice is coming; she’ll show you pluck; she has it to spare. And we’ll have that cruise through the islands. We’ll make it a small family affair and take along little Si. Meantime Paul must see that the night watchman gives the house special attention, and I’ll ask him to come in oftener with his violin." *CHAPTER XIV* *THE SALMON-TROLLERS*