Her sudden change of mood was a revelation to Tredennis. He began to realize what he had dimly felt from the first, that her mental attitude toward him was one of half-conscious defiance of his very thought of her. He had not known why he had felt at times that his mere presence prompted her to present her worldly, mocking little philosophies in their most incontrovertible and daring form, and that it was her whim to make the worst of herself and her theories for his benefit. He accused himself angrily in secret of overestimating his importance in her eyes, and had reiterated impatiently that there was no reason why she should be at all specially aware of his existence when he was near her, and it had been one of his grievances against himself that, in spite of this, every time they met he had felt the same thing, and had resented and been puzzled by it. But he had never before seen her look as she looked now. One of his private sources of wonder had been the perfect self-control which restrained her from exhibiting anything approaching a shadow of real feeling upon any subject. He had seen her under circumstances which would have betrayed nine women out of ten into some slight display of irritation, and she had always maintained the airy serenity of demeanor which deprived all persons and incidents of any weight whatever when they assumed the form of obstacles, and her practicable little smile and calm impartiality of manner had never failed her. He had heard her confess that it was her chief weakness to pride herself upon her quiet adroitness in avoiding all things unpleasant or emotional, and upon her faithfulness to her resolve not to permit herself to be disturbed. "I have seen people who enjoyed their emotions," she had said, "but I never enjoyed mine, even when I was very young. I definitely disliked them. I am too self-conscious to give myself up to them simply. If I had one, I should think about it and analyze it and its effects upon me. I should be saying all the time, 'Now I am hot--now I am cold'; and when it was over I should be tired, not only of the feeling itself, but of taking my own temperature." And now she stood before him for the instant a new creature,--weaker and stronger than he had dreamed it possible she could be,--her eyes bright with some strange feeling, a spot of color burning on each pale cheek. He was so bewildered and impressed that he was slow to speak, and, when he began, felt himself at so severe a disadvantage that his consciousness of it gave his voice a rigid sound. "I do not think," he began, "that I know what to say"-- Bertha stopped him.