She looked up as she saw him approaching and smiled.
"You found your friend well ?" she said.
"Very well, indeed!" replied Gwent, promptly--"In fact, I never knew he was ill!" Manella gave her peculiar little uplift of the head which was one of her many fascinating gestures.
"He is not ill"-- she said--"He only pretends! That is all! He has some reason for pretending.

I think it is love!" Gwent laughed.
"Not a bit of it! He's the last man in the world to worry himself about love!" Manella glanced him over with quite a superior air.
"Ah, perhaps you do not know!" And she waved her hands expressively.
"There was a wonderful lady came here to see him some weeks ago--she stole up the hill at night, like a spirit--a little, little fairy woman with golden hair--" Gwent pricked up his ears and stood at attention.
"Yes?
Really?
You don't say so! 'A little fairy woman'?
Sounds like a story!" "She wore the most lovely clothes"-- went on Manella, clasping her hands in ecstasy--"She stayed at the Plaza one night--I waited upon her.

I saw her in her bed--she had skin like satin, and eyes like blue stars--her hair fell nearly to her ankles--she was like a dream! And she went up the hill by moonlight all by herself, to find HIM!" Gwent listened with close interest.
"And I presume she found him ?" Manella nodded, and a sigh escaped her.
"Oh, yes, she found him! He told me that.

And I am sure--something tells me HERE" and she pressed one hand against her heart--"by the way he spoke--that he loves her!" "You seem to be a very observant young woman," said Gwent, smiling--"One would think you were in love with him yourself!" She raised her large dark eyes to his with perfect frankness.
"I am!" she said--"I see no shame in that! He is a fine man--it is good to love him!" Gwent was completely taken aback.

Here was primitive passion with a vengeance!--passion which admitted its own craving without subterfuge.
Manella's eyes were still uplifted in a kind of childlike confidence.
"I am happy to love him!" she went on--"I wish only to serve him.