it was possible to enter dryshod the boat her playfellow had painted with
brilliant hues of red and blue, because a neighbor's gay skiff had
pleased her fancy.

She now thought of these and many similar acts, and that he had never
promised her anything, only placed the finished article before her as a
matter of course.

It had never entered his mind to ask compensation for his gifts or thanks
for his acts, like curly-headed Syrus. Silently he rendered her service
after service; but, unfortunately, at this hour Xanthe was not disposed
to acknowledge it.

People grow angry with no one more readily than the person from whom they
have received many favors which they are unable to repay; women, no
matter whether young or old, resemble goddesses in the fact that they
cheerfully accept every gift from a man as an offering that is their due,
so long as they are graciously disposed toward the giver, but to-day
Xanthe was inclined, to be vexed with her playmate.

A thousand joys and sorrows, shared in common, bound them to each other,
and in the farthest horizons of her recollections lay an event which had
given her affection for him a new direction. His mother and hers had
died on the same day, and since then Xanthe had thought it her duty to
watch over and care for him, at first, probably, only as a big live doll,
afterward in a more serious way. And now he was deceiving her and going
to ruin. Yet Phaon was so entirely different from the wild fellows in
Syracuse.

From a child he had been one of those who act without many words. He