“Die, I suppose,” he said, with again that quaver of self-compassion in his voice, “or go to the dogs, which will be easy enough. You may say, why didn’t I die here and be done with it? I don’t know--I’m sure I wanted to. It was that doctor fellow, and that woman that talks with her eyebrows, and that confounded cad, Leigh--they wouldn’t let me. And I’ve got so weak; if you don’t go away this moment I’ll cry like a dashed baby!” with a more piteous quaver than ever in the remnant of his once manly voice. All that Bee could do was to throw her arms round his neck and draw his head upon her shoulder, which he resisted fiercely for a moment, then yielded to in the abandonment of his weakness. Poor Charlie felt, perhaps, a momentary sweetness in the relaxation of all the bonds of self-control, and all the well-meaning attempts to keep him from injuring himself by emotion; the unexpected outburst did him good, partly because it was a breach of all the discipline of the sick room. Presently he came to himself and pushed Bee away. “What do you come bothering about?” he said; “you ought to have left me alone. I’ve made my bed, and I’ve got to lie on it. I don’t suppose that anyone has taken the trouble to--ask about me?” he added, after a little while, in what was intended for a careless tone. “Oh, Charlie, everyone who has known; but papa would let nobody know: except at Oxford. We--went to Oxford----” He got up on his pillow with his eyes shining out of their hollow sockets, his long limbs coming to the ground with a faint thump. Poor Charlie was young enough to have grown during his illness, and those gaunt limbs seemed unreasonably long. “You went to Oxford!” he said, “and you saw--” “Dear Charlie, they will say I am exciting you--doing you harm----” “You saw?” he cried, bringing down his fist upon the table with a blow that made the very floor shake. “Yes,” said Bee, trembling, “we saw--or rather papa saw----” He pushed up the shade of the lamp with his long bony fingers, and fixed his eyes, bright with fever, on her face. “Oh, Charlie, don’t look at me so!--the lady whom you used to talk to me about--whom I saw in the academy----” “Yes?”--he grasped her hand across the table with a momentary hot pressure. “She came and saw papa in the hotel. She told him about you, and that you had--oh, Charlie, and she so old--as old as----” “Hold your tongue!” he cried, violently, and then with a long-drawn breath, “What more? She told him--and he was rude, I suppose. Confound him! Confound--confound them all!” “I will not say another word unless you are quiet,” said Bee, her spirit rising; “put up your feet on the sofa and be quiet, and remember all the risk you are running--or I will not say another word.”