had been betrayed into such an unstinted expression of her honest
interest. "All for show and display," she muttered, as she bowed her head
to search out new titles; "bought by the pound and stacked by the cord;
doing nobody any good--their owners least of all." She resolved to admire
openly nothing more whatever.

Mrs. Bates sank into one of the big chairs and motioned Jane towards
another. "Your father was a great reader," she said, with a resumption of
her retrospective expression. "He was very fond of books--especially
poetry. He often read aloud to me; when he thought I was likely to be
alone, he would bring his Shakespeare over. I believe I could give you
even now, if I was put to it, Antony's address to the Romans. Yes; and
almost all of Hamlet's soliloquies, too."

Jane was preparing to make a stand against this woman, and here,
apparently, was the opportunity. "Do you mean to tell me," she inquired,
with something approaching sternness, "that my father--_my father_--was
ever fond of poetry and--and music, and--and all that sort of thing?"

"Certainly. Why not? I remember your father as a high-minded young man,
with a great deal of good taste; I always thought him much above the
average. And that Shakespeare of his--I recall it perfectly. It was a
chubby little book bound in brown leather, with an embossed stamp, and
print a great deal too fine for _my eyes_. _He_ always had to do the
reading; and he read very pleasantly." She scanned Jane closely. "Perhaps
you have never done your father justice."

Jane felt herself driven to defence--even to apology. "The fact is," she
said, "pa is so quiet; he never says much of anything. I'm about the only
one of the family who knows him very well, and I guess I don't know him