"I wish I hadn't a face that gives me away always!" he exclaimed. "Though to you I don't mind very much. Well, I wanted to ask you two or three things, if I may." Mrs. Mansfield sat down on her favorite sofa, with her feet on a stool. "Anything," she said. "Do you mind telling me exactly what you thought of my music the other evening? Did you--did you think it feeble stuff? Did you, perhaps, think it"--he paused--"provincial?" he concluded, with an effort. "Provincial!" Heath was answered, but he persisted. "What did you think?" "I thought it alarming." "Alarming?" "Disturbing. It has disturbed me." "Disturbed your mind?" "Or my heart, perhaps." "But why? How?" "I'm not sure that I could tell you that." Heath sat down. When he was not composing or playing he sometimes felt very uncertain of himself, lacking in self-confidence. He often had moments when he felt not merely doubtful as to his talent, but as if he were less in almost every way than the average man. He endeavored to conceal this disagreeable weakness, which he suffered under and despised, but could not rid himself of; and in consequence his manner was sometimes uneasy. It was rather uneasy now. He longed to be reassured. Mrs. Mansfield found him strangely different from the man who had played to her, who had scarcely seemed to care what she thought, what anyone thought of his music. "I do wish you would try to tell me!" he said anxiously. "Why should you care what I think?" she said, almost as if in rebuke. "Perhaps my music is terrible rubbish!" "It certainly is not, or it could not have made a strong impression upon me." "It did really make a strong impression?" "Very strong." "Then you think I have something in me worth developing, worth taking care of?" "I am sure you have." "I wonder how I ought to live?" he exclaimed. "Is that what you came to ask me?" Her fiery eyes seemed to search him. She sat very still, looking intensely alive. "To-night I feel as if I didn't know, didn't know at all! You see, I avoid so many things, so many experiences that I might have." "Do you?" "Yes. I think I've done that for years. I know I'm doing it now." He moved restlessly. "Mrs. Shiffney has asked me again to go yachting with her." "But I thought you had refused." "I did. But she has been again to-day. She says your daughter is going." "Charmian has been asked." "Mrs. Shiffney said she had accepted the invitation." "Yes." "And now I'm to give my answer on Sunday." "You seem quite upset about it," she said, without sarcasm.