Paul sent her books of poems, and novels, and all sorts of works, to read, that she might be amused and improve her mind; and it was astonishing how rapidly the young lady mastered their contents, and how ably she used the sentiments of some of those poems that were full of love and tenderness. It was surely native inborn tact this. The cynic would say that all women have it; that nature has given them cunning instead of physical strength. What a woman this would have been with a good education! What a woman with the French language on her tongue! The judgment of Shuffleton Gibbs when he sat in the show and thought he could make a fortune by her cleverness at cards, was that of a shrewd observer, though he had been disappointed. What happy days these were to the Lieutenant, what happy hours, these stolen intervals, as Chrissy got better. Chrissy she had always been called she said, and that was nearer the truth than any other word she had spoken; for that old clown who taught her to read and write, had called her Chris in those wild days of her childhood. With good treatment and comfort, she had soon recovered her strength, and the roses came back to her cheeks, the roundness to her arms, and the brightness to her eyes. There was a little vulgarity in her appearance, and in her manners. The red in her cheeks was not of a delicate rosy hue, and her voice could not be called musical. Her nose was anything but classical,--not that we care for classical noses; no, nor for classical foreheads either for that matter. To Paul Somerton Chrissy was beautiful, and that which you would call vulgar he looked upon as frankness and innocence, which charmed him all the more on that account. Mr. Williamson soon had a surfeit of all this. The Lieutenant became quite a bore to him, and as obstinate as a mule. He would take no advice, and listen to no arguments that in any way interfered with his wild idea of living with this woman in some distant land. That special feature of interest in the woman’s history which had, as you will remember, brought up the name of Shuffleton Gibbs, soon disappeared; for Chrissy had described to Paul a young and dashing fellow as her husband, and they had both taken the description as true of course. The Lieutenant might have asked Macshawser what sort of a fellow Crawley was; but neither he nor the clever barrister thought of this, or if they had, perhaps the Lieutenant would have put his veto upon such a course, seeing that it might in some way have led to the detection of Paul as Chrissy’s protector.