CHAPTER V.
"My love is like the sea, As changeful and as free; Sometimes she's angry, sometimes rough, Yet oft she's smooth and calm enough-- Ay, much too calm for me." It is Perpetua.

A sad-eyed, a tearful-eyed Perpetua, but a lovely Perpetua for all that.
"Well ?" says he.
"_Sh!_" says she again, shaking her head ominously, and putting her forefinger against her lip.

"Come in here," says she softly, under her breath.
"Here," when he does come in, is a most untidy place, made up of all things heterogeneous.

Now that he is nearer to her, he can see that she has been crying vehemently, and that the tears still stand thick within her eyes.
"I felt I _must_ see you," says she, "to tell you--to ask you.

To--Oh! you _heard_ what she said! Do--do _you_ think---- ?" "Not at all, not at all," declares the professor hurriedly.
"Don't--_don't_ cry, Perpetua! Look here," laying his hand nervously upon her shoulder and giving her a little angry shake.