Nell of Shorne Mills

"Yes," said Nell, forgetting her own misery in sympathy for him.

He looked at her quickly.

"You have noticed it?"

Nell inclined her head.

"I have lived in the house--I have seen----" she faltered.

He nodded once or twice.

"Yes; I suppose that you could not help seeing that there has been a--a

gulf between us; that we are not as other, happier, husbands and wives."

He sighed, and passed his hand across his brow wearily.

"But we are not the only couple who, living in the same house, are

asunder. I am not the only man who has to endure, secretly and with a

smiling face, the fact that his wife does not care for him."

Nell raised her head, and the color came to her pale face.

"You are wrong--wrong!" she said, in a low voice, but eagerly.

"Wrong? I beg your pardon?" he said gravely.

"It is all a terrible mistake," said Nell. "She does care for you. Oh,

yes, yes! It is you who have been blind; it is your fault. It is hers,

too; but you are the man, and it is your place to speak--to tell her

that you love her----"

He reddened as he turned to her with a curious eagerness and surprise.

"I don't understand you," he said, with a shake in his voice. "Do you

mean me to infer that--that I have been under a delusion in thinking

that my wife----"

Nell rose and stretched out her hands with a gesture of infinite

weariness.

"Oh, how blind you are!" she said, almost impatiently. "You think that

she does not care for you, and she thinks that of you, and you are both

in love with each other."

His face glowed, and a strange brightness--the glow of hope--shone in

his eyes.

"Take care!" he said huskily. "You--you use words lightly, perhaps

unthinkingly----"

Nell laughed, with a kind of weary irritation.

"I am telling you the truth; I am trying to open your eyes," she said.

"She loves you."

"Why--why do you think so? Have you ever heard her address a word to me

that had a note of tenderness in it?"

"Have you ever addressed such a word to her?" retorted Nell.

He started, and gazed at her confusedly.

"You have always treated her as if she were a mere acquaintance, some

one who was of no consequence to you. Oh, yes, you have been polite,

kind, in a way, but not in a way a woman wants. I am only a girl,

but--but"--she thought again of Drake, of her own love story, and her

lips trembled--"but I have seen enough of the world to know that there

is nothing which will hurt and harden a woman more than the 'kindness'

with which you have treated her. I think--I don't know, but I think if I

cared for a man, I would rather that he should beat me than treat me as

if I were just a mere acquaintance whom he was bound to treat politely.

And did you think that it was she who was to show her heart? No; a woman

would rather die than do that. It is the man who must speak, who must

tell her, ask her for her love. And you haven't, have you, Lord Wolfer?"