That afternoon she went off for a walk by herself as it was frequently her custom to do. She was allowed perfect freedom of action after the morning working hours,--she could go and come as she liked,--and both Dr. Dimitrius and his mother made it plainly evident that they trusted her implicitly. She avoided Geneva--she instinctively felt that it would be wiser not to be seen there, as the people of the hotel where she had stayed might recognise her. One of her favourite walks was along the Mornex road to a quaint little villa occupied by Professor Chauvet. This somewhat grim and ironical man of much learning had taken a great fancy to her, and she always made herself charming in his company, partly out of real liking for him and partly out of compassion for his loneliness. For, apparently, he had no one in the world to care whether he lived or died, the only person to attend upon him being a wrinkled, toothless old woman from the Canton Grisons, whose cooking was execrable, while her excessive cleanliness was beyond reproach. Diana loved to hear the Professor’s half-cynical, half-kindly talk,--she laughingly encouraged him to “lay down the law,” as he delighted to do, on all things human and divine, and she was never tired of turning over his really unique and wonderful collection of unset gems, of which he had enough to excite the cupidity of any American wife of a millionaire,--enough certainly to make him rich, though he lived in the style of an exceedingly poor man. “You have the saddest fire I ever saw!” she said, on this particular afternoon, as she entered his study without warning, as she was now quite accustomed to do, and found him sitting absorbed over a book, regardless of the smouldering wood in the grate which threatened to become altogether extinguished. “Let me make it cheerful for you!” She set to work, while he pushed his spectacles up from his eyes to his forehead and regarded her with unassisted vision. “What have you been doing to yourself?” he asked, then. “Are you sure you are quite well?” She looked up from the logs she was piling dexterously together, surprised and smiling. “Quite well? Of course I am! Never felt better! Do I look ill?” Professor Chauvet got up and stretched his legs. “Not ill,” he replied,--“No,--but feverish! Singularly so! Eyes too bright--lips too red,--spiteful women would say you had put belladonna in the one and carmine on the other! Let me feel your pulse!” She laughed, and gave him her hand. He pressed his fingers on the cool, firm wrist. “No--nothing the matter there!” he said, wrinkling his fuzzy brows in a puzzled line. “It is the pulse of youth and strong heart action. Well! What is it?” “What is _what_?” queried Diana, merrily, as she settled the logs to her satisfaction, and kindled them into sparkling flame. “I know of nothing in myself that is, or isn’t!” He smiled a wry smile.