第103章 Voices of Nature.(2)

"Miss Burton,"said Van Berg,after dinner,"I wish you would call on Miss Mayhew.I think she is greatly in need of a little of your inimitable tact and skill.'A wounded spirit who can bear?'And in such an emergency,you are the best surgeon I know of.I think some of us wounded her deeply and unpardonably by continuing to associate her with Sibley,after he revealed what an unmitigated rascal he was.Strong as appearances were against her,I feel that I cannot forgive myself that I took anything for granted in a case like that.""I am glad,"she answered,"that you have come to my own conclusion,that Miss Mayhew,with all her faults,is too good a girl to be guilty of a passion for a man like Sibley.If she regards him in any such way as I do,I do not wonder that it has made her ill to be so misjudged.I must plead guilty also to having wronged her in my thoughts.While I try to exercise the broadest charity,my calling,as a teacher,has brought me in contact with many girls that--through immaturity and innate foolishness--are guilty of conduct that taxes one's faith in human nature severely.Goodish sort of girls are sometimes infatuated with very bad men.I suppose it is evident to all that Miss Mayhew's early and,indeed,present influences are sadly against her;but unfortunate as have been her associations of late,I am coming to the belief that,however faulty she may be,she is not naturally either silly or weak.But my acquaintance with her is very slight,and I must confess I do not understand her very well.For some reason she shuns me and has evidently disliked me from the first.""I don't understand her at all,"said Van Berg,in a tone that proved him greatly annoyed with himself."I have thought that Ihad sounded the shallow depths of her character several times,and then some new and perplexing phase would present itself,and put me all to sea again.It may seem ludicrous to you that her beauty should irritate me so greatly because of its incongruous associations.""Not at all,"she replied,with a little nod."I was not long in discovering that you were a pagan,and that beauty was your divinity.""Correct in all respects save the divinity,"he answered promptly;and he would have said more,but she passed into the parlor among the other guests.

Ida found herself too weak and unnerved to walk far,but she discovered a secluded nook into which the sunlight streamed with a grateful warmth;for although the day was warm,she shivered with cold as if the chill in her heart had diffused itself even to her hands and feet.Dense shrubbery hid her from the path along which she saw Stanton pass in his fruitless quest.