The Real Charlotte. 241 



it increased his pity for her a thousandfold, but it stirred 

 him with a strange and selfish pleasure to think that she had 

 suffered. Whatever it was that was in her mind, it had 

 given him a glimpse of that deeper part of her nature, so 

 passionately guessed at, so long unfindable. He did not 

 for an instant think of Hawkins, having explained away that 

 episode to himself some time before in the light of his new 

 reading of Francie's character ; it was Charlotte's face as she 

 confronted Mary Norris in the market that came to him, 

 and the thought of what it must be to be under her roof and 

 dependent on her. He saw now the full pain that Francie 

 bore in hearing herself proclaimed as the lure by which he 

 was to be captured, and that he should have brought her 

 thus low roused a tenderness in him that would not be gain- 

 said. 



"/don't think it," he said, stammering ; "you might be- 

 lieve that I think more about you than other people do. I 

 know you feel things more than you let anyone see, and 

 that makes it all the worse for anyone who — who is sorry 

 for you, and wants to tell you so — " 



This halting statement, so remarkably different in diction 

 from the leisurely sentences in which Christopher usually 

 expressed himself, did not tend to put Francie more at her 

 ease. She reddened slowly and painfully as his short- 

 sighted, grey eyes rested upon her. Hawkins filled so 

 prominent a place in her mind that Christopher's ambiguous 

 allusions seemed to be directed absolutely at him, and her 

 hand instinctively slipped into her pocket and clasped the 

 letter that was there, as if in that way she could hold her 

 secret fast. 



" Ah, well," — she tried to say it lightly — " I don't want so 

 very much pity yet awhile ; when I do, I'll ask you 

 for it ! " 



She disarmed the words of her flippancy by the look with 

 which she lifted her dark-lashed eyes to him, and Christo- 

 pher's last shred of common sense sank in their tender 

 depths and was lost there. 



" Is that true ? " he said, without taking his eyes from her 

 face. " Do you really trust me ? would you promise always 

 to trust me?" 



"Yes, I'm sure I'd always trust you," answered Francie, 



Q 



