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"But what good will that do me?" Mitchy appealed.

"Don't you care enough for her to want to help HER?" Then before he could speak, "Poor little darling dear!" his hostess tenderly ejaculated. "What does she think or dream? Truly she's laying up treasure!"

"Oh he likes her," said Mitchy. "He likes her in fact extremely."

"Do you mean he has told you so?"

"Oh no—we never mention it! But he likes her," Mr. Mitchett stubbornly repeated. "And he's thoroughly straight."

Mrs. Brookenham for a moment turned these things over; after which she came out in a manner that visibly surprised him. "It isn't as if you wished to be nasty about him, is it?—because I know you like him yourself. You're so wonderful to your friends"—oh she could let him see that she knew!—"and in such different and exquisite ways. There are those like HIM"—she signified her other visitor—"who get everything out of you and whom you really appear fond of, or at least to put up with, just FOR that. Then there are those who ask nothing—and whom you're fond of in spite of it."