spell over her.

"I have been sitting with your grandfather for half an hour," Ste. Marie
said. And she said:

"Oh, I'm glad! I'm very glad! You always cheer him up. He hasn't been
too cheerful or too well of late." She unnecessarily twisted a chair
about, and after a moment sat down in it. And she gave a little laugh.
"This friendship which has grown up between my grandfather and you,"
said she--"I don't understand it at all. Of course, he knew your father
and all that; but you two seem such very different types, I shouldn't
think you would amuse each other at all. There's Mr. Hartley, for
example. I should expect my grandfather to like him very much better
than you, but he doesn't--though I fancy he approves of him much more."

She laughed again, but a different laugh; and when he heard it Ste.
Marie's eyes gleamed a little and his hands moved beside him.

"I expect," said she--"I expect, you know, that he just likes you
without stopping to think why--as everybody else does. I fancy it's just
that. What do you think?"

"Oh, I?" said the man. "I--how should I know? I know it's a great
privilege to be allowed to see him--such a man as that. And I know we
get on wonderfully well. He doesn't condescend, as most old men do who
have led important lives. We just talk as two men in a club might talk,
and I tell him stories and make him laugh. Oh yes, we get on wonderfully
well."

"Oh," said she, "I've often wondered what you talk about. What did you