When he called, as he had said, in the evening, she looked much better, and there was even a touch of playfulness in her manner.  He could not but hope some crisis had been passed.  The money she had received for the ring had probably something to do with it.  Perhaps she had not known how valuable the ring was.  Thereupon in his conscientiousness he began to doubt whether he had given her its worth.  In reality he had exceeded it by a few pounds, as he discovered upon inquiry afterward in London.  Anyhow it did not much matter, he said to himself:  he was sure to find some way of restoring it to her.

Suddenly she looked up, and said hurriedly: 

“I can never repay you, Dr. Faber.  No one can do the impossible.”

“You can repay me,” returned Faber.

“How?” she said, looking startled.

“By never again thinking of obligation to me.”

“You must not ask that of me,” she rejoined.  “It would not be right.”

The tinge of a rose not absolutely white floated over her face and forehead as she spoke.

“Then I shall be content,” he replied, “if you will say nothing about it until you are well settled.  After that I promise to send you a bill as long as a snipe’s.”

She smiled, looked up brightly, and said,

“You promise?”

“I do.”

“If you don’t keep your promise, I shall have to take severe measures.  Don’t fancy me without money.  I could pay you now—­at least I think so.”

It was a great good sign of her that she could talk about money plainly as she did.  It wants a thoroughbred soul to talk just right about money.  Most people treat money like a bosom-sin:  they follow it earnestly, but do not talk about it at all in society.

“I only pay six shillings a week for my lodgings!” she added, with a merry laugh.

What had become of her constraint and stateliness?  Courtesy itself seemed gone, and simple trust in its place!  Was she years younger than he had thought her?  She was hemming something, which demanded her eyes, but every now and then she cast up a glance, and they were black suns unclouding over a white sea.  Every look made a vintage in the doctor’s heart.  There could be no man in the case!  Only again, would fifty pounds, with the loss of a family ring, serve to account for such a change?  Might she not have heard from somebody since he saw her yesterday?  In her presence he dared not follow the thought.

Some books were lying on the table which could not well be Mrs. Puckridge’s.  He took up one:  it was In Memoriam.

“Do you like Tennyson?” she asked.

“That is a hard question to answer straight off,” he replied.—­He had once liked Tennyson, else he would not have answered so.—­“Had you asked me if I liked In Memoriam” he went on, “I could more easily have answered you.”

“Then, don’t you like In Memoriam?”