"I know; that is what you say"--this with an adorable uptilt of the pretty chin and a flash of the dark eyes which an instant before had been slumbrous wells of studious abstraction. "But your _Fleming_ is going to prove the contrary; it may not be what you want him to do, but it will be what he will insist upon doing before you get through with him. You have already indicated it in the story, unconsciously, perhaps. When _Fidelia_ surprises him, _Fleming_ is almost ready to kill her; not in defense of the principle he has set up, but to save his own miserable life." "That is a part of his humanity," insisted the craftsman stubbornly. "You don't know _Fleming_ yet. Have you ever met _Fidelia_?" "Not as you have drawn her--no. She is too unutterably fine. If she had a single shred of humanity about her, I should suspect you of meaning to fall in love with her, farther along--to the humiliation and despair of poor _Joan_, who, as you say, is a mere daughter of men." "But how about _Joan_?" he fretted. "Is she out of drawing, too?" "Yes; you are distorting her the other way--making her too inhumanly worldly and insincere." Then, with an abruptness that was like a slap in the face: "If you didn't spend so many evenings at Doctor Bertie's, you would get both _Fidelia_ and _Joan_ in better drawing." He flushed and drew himself up, with the stabbed _amour propre_ prompting him to make some stinging retort contrasting the wells of truth with the brackish waters of sheer worldliness. Then he saw how inadequate it would be; how utterly impossible it was to meet this charmingly vindictive young person upon any grounds save those of her own choosing. "That is the first really unkind thing I have ever heard you say," was the mild reproach which was all that the reactionary second thought would sanction. "Unkind to whom?--to you, or to Miss Farnham?" "Ask yourself," he countered weakly; and she laughed at him. "There is another of your failings, Kenneth. You haven't always the courage of your convictions. What you are thinking is that I am a spiteful little cat. Why don't you say it out loud, like a man?" "Because I'm not thinking it," he denied, adding: "But I do think you are a little inclined to be unfair to Miss Charlotte." "Am I? Let us see if I am. I accuse her of nothing but a slavish devotion to custom and the conventions. What did she say when you read her the chapter before this one: where _Fidelia_ goes down to the dining-room at midnight and finds _Fleming_ breaking into the silver-safe where the money is hidden?" "I'm not reading the story to her," he admitted, and again she laughed. "But you do talk it over with her; you couldn't help doing that," she persisted. "Sometimes," he allowed. "Well, what did she say when you came to that part where _Fidelia_ makes _Fleming_ sit down while she tries to convince him that house-breaking is a crime. You don't dare tell me what she said."