"Shall I look over your trunks and
bureau, then?" she asked.
"Certainly, while I go to sleep and dream what a jolly thing it is to have
you here." Then, pretending to sleep, he watched her with careful hands
examine his belongings, with a contemptuous little smile at this piece of
bungling mending or an anxious frown over that frayed place. Then how
neatly she folded and laid back all the good, and seated herself with a
pile before her and began to sew! When he opened his eyes she handed him
the keys.
"No, Percy, keep them: I make all right and title to them over to you," he
said.
From that day he seemed to feel delight in her companionship, reading to
her hour after hour while she sewed, always choosing some poetical or
light bit of reading--"To suit my capacity," she thought.
So they had gone on week after week--with the single exception of the
Rollins episode--without any change. He was a rare favorite in society,
and every day received a host of calls from gentlemen, baskets of fruits
and flowers from ladies. Always, when a card was sent up, she would gather
all her womanish "traps" together and go to Mrs. Keller--this, too, in
spite of his earnest invitation to her to remain.
"No: you can have a pleasanter call with no ladies present, and Mrs.
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