in vain--that was not your wont heretofore."

"Oh, that's it. Ah well, one can't be poking in books all the time.
And for the past few days my eyes have been aching."

"With secret tears?" he teased.

She gave him a wide, serious look.

"With secret tears," she repeated.

"_Ah perfido_!" he trilled, in order to avoid the scene which he
feared ... But he was on the wrong scent. She herself interrupted him
with the question whether he would stay to supper.

He was curious to find the causes of the changes that he felt here.
For that reason and also because he was not without compunction, he
consented to stay.

She rang and ordered a second cover to be laid.

Louise looked at her mistress with a disapproving glance and went.

"Dear me," he laughed, "the servants are against me ... I am lost."

"You have taken to noticing such things very recently." She gave a
perceptible shrug.

"When a wife tells a husband of his newly acquired habits, he is
doubly lost," he answered and gave her his arm.