"That's all right," said Celia, bending over the slips with the literary frown on her young face. "Oh, I can recognize some of them; that's Pevensey Castle; and that's Knowle House, before it was rebuilt; and, surely, this one is meant for Battle Abbey." "I say, how clever you are!" he exclaimed, gazing at her with admiration. "Oh, no, I'm not," said Celia, with a smile; "I just happen to remember them because I've come across them in the course of my own work. Let us go over the others." She turned to his pile of books and, still with knit brows, tried to find the counterpart of the other pulls; and the young fellow watched her, his eyes growing thoughtful and something more, as they dwelt upon her face. "You mustn't worry any more," he begged her, presently. "You're losing all your own time; I feel ashamed; I'm most awfully grateful to you." "Not at all," said Celia. "I'm afraid I've been of very little help to you; and I don't see that I can do any more----" "No, no," he said, quickly; "don't take any more trouble. It wouldn't matter so much if I had plenty of time; but I haven't. You see"--he coloured--"one doesn't get too well paid for this kind of work, and can't afford----" He coloured still more deeply, and his voice dropped below the regulation whisper in which one is permitted to speak in the Reading Room. Celia glanced at him, and saw that he was poorly dressed, that his shirt-cuffs were frayed, and that he had the peculiar look which is stamped on the countenances of so many of the frequenters of the Reading Room. "Just tell me what you would do if you were in my fix," he said. Celia hesitated for a moment, then a smile broke over her face which transfigured it and made it seem to the young fellow absolutely lovely. "I should invent histories for them," she said. "It would be so much easier--and, perhaps, ever so much more interesting." "Oh, that's stunning!" he exclaimed, in a whisper. "Of course, that's the way. I say, what a brick you are! Would you mind telling me your name?" "Grant--Celia Grant," she told him, without hesitation. "Mine's Rex--Reggie Rex," he said. "I've often noticed you and wondered what kind of work you did--But I beg your pardon; I mustn't disturb you any longer." They both fell to work, and Celia heard his fountain-pen racing over the paper; once or twice he chuckled, as if he were enjoying a joke; but very soon Celia forgot him; and when, at last, she looked up from her work, she found his place empty; but on going out for her lunch she saw him standing by one of the pillars of the portico. He blushed at sight of her, moved forward, hesitated, then approached her. "You're going to an A.B.C. for your lunch?" he said, with a mixture of a man's timidity and a boy's audacity. "May I--will you let me come with you? I feel as if I hadn't thanked you enough; I couldn't do it in that stuffy old hole, where you can't speak above your breath."