"Change?" repeated Claymore interrogatively, with a quick flash of interest in his eyes despite the studied calmness of his manner. "Yes. He has n't been the same since--since--" "Since when?" the artist inquired, as she hesitated. "Why, it must be almost ever since we came home and you began to paint him," Celia returned thoughtfully; "though I confess I have noticed it only lately. Has n't it struck you?" Her companion, instead of replying directly, began carefully to examine the carving on the head of his walking-stick. "You forget how slightly I knew him before," he said. "What sort of a change do you mean?" "He has developed. He seems all at once to be becoming a man." "He is twenty-eight. It is n't strange that there should be signs of the man about him, I suppose." "But he has always seemed so boyish," Celia insisted, with the air of one who finds it difficult to make herself understood. "Very likely something has happened to sober him," Tom answered, with an effort to speak carelessly, which prevented him from noticing that Celia flushed slightly at his words. They had reached Miss Sathman's gate, and he held it open for her. "It was very good of you to come this afternoon," he told her. "When will you take your next lesson?" "I can't tell," she replied. "I'll let you know. Won't you come in?" The invitation was given with a certain faint wistfulness, but he declined, and lifting his hat, bade her good-night. She turned on the doorstep and looked after him as his strong, resolute figure passed down the street, and a sigh escaped her. "I wonder if Tom will seem to me so reserved and cold after we are married," was her thought. II People in general thought Tom Claymore's nature cold and reserved because his manner was so. He was reticent perhaps to a fault, but the reticent man who is cold is a monster, and Tom was far from being anything so disagreeable as that. His was the shy artistic temperament, and the circumstances of his rather lonely life had fostered a habit of saying little while he yet felt deeply, and since he took life seriously, he seldom found himself disposed to open his heart in ordinary conversation. Even with his betrothed he had not yet outworn the reserve which every year of his life had strengthened, and Celia, despite her betrothal, was not wholly free from the common error of supposing that, because he did not easily express his sentiment, he lacked warmth of feeling. She had been his pupil in Boston, and it was for the sake of being near her that he had established himself at Salem for the summer, making a pretext of the fact that he had promised to paint the portrait of her cousin, Ralph Thatcher.