He leaned back in his chair, watching her with a keen appreciation of her loveliness and her unconscious betrayal of her own emotions. “So! after all you didn’t approve of me the other day?” he said, with perfect good humor; “you were really condemning my ethics while you applauded--you know you did applaud, you told me you congratulated me on my ‘great speech.’” Rose returned his teasing look seriously. “I did congratulate you; it was a great speech, but I didn’t like it,” she said in a low voice and with an evident effort. “And why?” he asked, his brilliant gaze bent more fully on her. She turned away, her cheek red, and resting her chin on her hand she fell to studying the fire though she was still courageous. “I didn’t like the tone of it; you belittle your own great gifts,” she said softly, hesitating slightly and choosing her words with care; “you make them of your own creation when they are really given you, given you as the five talents were given to the man in the Scriptures. You haven’t laid them away in a napkin; why then are you ashamed to give the glory where it is justly due? You can’t deny that there is glory in it all!” He smiled. “You make me feel like a thief. To be entirely honest, I’m not religious, but I read the Bible and Shakespeare as dictionaries of eloquence. Do you think me a dreadful sinner--worse than those on whom the tower of Siloam fell?” Rose bit her lip. “I’ve no doubt you think me a hypocrite!” she replied. “I should like to tell you what I think of you,” he said softly, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, looking across at her, “but I’m afraid--afraid of you!” She laughed a little with a charming diffidence, for she had met the sweetness of his glance which was full of gentle admiration. “I sometimes wonder,” he continued, “how you would meet a great moral question which involved your happiness and, perhaps, that of another whom you loved.” She shivered a little, stretching out one slender hand to the fire. “Ah,” she said, with a faint smile, “I hope I may never meet such a question! I see you make me a Pharisee.” “God forbid!” he replied quickly, “you belong rather to the Christian martyrs; I’m either a Barbarian or a Scythian!” They both laughed softly at this, and Rose forgot her momentary embarrassment. “I should try to be just!” she said. He shook his head with that rare smile of his which seemed half mocking, half caressing. “You couldn’t be!” he retorted provokingly, “you are a little Puritan, narrow, firm, righteous; I begin to be more and more afraid of you!” She lifted her chin. “You think me too narrow to be just? Isn’t that the charge that you worldlings always bring against--against--” “The righteous?” he supplied quickly. They laughed again. “You convict me out of my own mouth; I shall dare no more arguments!” “Ah, now you know how I feel under your criticisms!” he flashed back at her.