risked the spoiling her beauty by all these weary, sleepless nights,
especially for a man she did not love." And then to think she was actually
willing to work and slave for him, and support him out of her share of the
booty, and let him fool away his own on other women! "Wonder what the
little dame means to buy her own fine things with, for even robins must
get clothing? I'll ask her that. Bless the little woman's soul! she makes
me think of her so much that I believe I'm half in love with her. Um!" and
he stopped: "I'm getting sentimental and poetic, I swear! But if it were
in me to love anything that was not beautiful, I believe I could love this
little girl, who has come into my life so strangely. She owns up to having
loved, and is done with all the stale farce. Some fools," and he felt very
indignant, "slighted her because she had no beauty, though, upon my soul,
now I think of it, I'm not so certain about that. There's a something in
her face takes a man's breath--something that one would rather die than
lose if he once loved it, and which once loved would be better than any
beauty. What's that Spenser says?--

'A sweet, attractive kind of grace,...
The lineaments of gospel books,'

That's just it: it's a look that makes one think about one's prayers, if
one only knew them. But whether the man slighted her or not, he missed
it--confound him!--in losing such a love. I'll make her tell me his name.
And as for being my sister, that's all nonsense, of course, as she's my
wife." Then more thoughtfully, "Well, maybe not: a household where there
is no love is cruel--I knew that in my early home--and children are a
beastly trouble, and as expensive as a man's wines. She's a brick, this
wife of mine, and as sensible as steel. I'll put myself in her hands for
better or for worse, I vow I will!