But if you'd rather not, if it makes you tired--" "Courage, soldier, bear your burden," she said gaily.

"Mount your horse and get galloping," she added, motioning him to sit.
A moment later he was pouring out his soul through a pleasing voice, from fat lips, flanked by a high-coloured healthy cheek like a russet apple: "Like jewels of the sky they gleam, Your eyes of light, your eyes of fire; In their dark depths behold the dream Of Life's glad hope and Love's desire.
"Above your quiet brow, endowed With Grecian charm to crown your grace, Your hair in one soft Titian cloud Throws heavenly shadows on your face." "Well, I've never had verses written to me before," Kitty remarked demurely, when he had finished and sat looking at her questioningly.
"But 'dark depths'-- that isn't the right thing to say of my eyes! And Titian cloud of hair--is my hair Titian?
I thought Titian hair was bronzy-tawny was what Mr.Burlingame called it when he was spouting,"-- her upper lip curled in contempt.
"It isn't you, and you know it," he replied jerkily.

She bridled.
"Do you mean to say that you come and read to me without a word of explanation, so that I shouldn't misunderstand, verses written for another?
Am I to be told now that my eyes aren't eyes of light and eyes of fire, that I haven't got a Grecian brow?
Do you dare to say those verses don't fit me--except for the Titian hair and heavenly shadows?
And that I've got no right to think they're meant for me?
Is it so, that a man that's lived in my mother's house for years, eating at the same table with the family, and having his clothes mended free, with supper to suit him and no questions asked--is it so, that he reads me poetry, four lines at a stretch, and a rhyme every other line, and then announces it isn't for me!" Her eyes flashed, her bosom palpitated, her hand made passionate gestures, and she really seemed a young fury let loose.

For a moment he was deceived by her acting; he did not see the lurking grin in the depths of her eyes.
Her voice shook with assumed passion.

"Because I didn't show what I felt all these years, and only exposed my real feelings when you read those verses to me, do you think any man who was a gentleman wouldn't in the circumstances say, 'These verses are for you, Kitty Tynan'?
You betrayed me into showing you what I felt, and then you tell me your verses are for another girl!" "Girl! Girl! Girl!" he burst out.