He let me do it, and went on smoking without noticing me.

Then, after a little while, he began to tell me all about Father and his
death, that had come so suddenly while he seemed as well as ever, and
how he had worried about my probably not wanting to be left to him, and
that he wanted me to feel independent, but to please let him do all that
I would to help me, and not to feel that I was alone with nobody to love
me. That he was always there, and would be forever and ever.

And he did stay so late that Jasper had to send him home!

There is such a thing as a man's being a father and mother and grown
sister and brother and a college-chum and a preacher of the Gospel and a
family physician to a woman--with no possibility of being her husband
either. She wouldn't so drag such a man from his high estate as to think
of such a worldly relation in connection with him.

I have certainly collected some phenomena in the reaction of a woman's
heart this day. Did you choose me wisely for these experiments, Jane?

It takes a woman of nerve to go to housekeeping in a tinder-box, when
she isn't sure she even knows what flint is when she sees it, and might
strike out a spark without intending it at all.




CHAPTER IV

SWEETER WHEN TAMED?