 pride
and shame; his look fell before hers, but the constrained smile on his lips was
one of self-esteem at issue with adversity. He wore the dress of a gentleman,
but it was disorderly. His light overcoat hung unbuttoned, and in his hand he
crushed together a hat of soft felt.
    »Why have you come to see me, Reuben?« Miriam asked at length, speaking with
difficulty and in an offended tone.
    »Why shouldn't I, Miriam?« he returned quietly, steping nearer to her. »Till
a few days ago I knew nothing of the illness you have had, or I should, at all
events, have written. When I heard you had come to Naples, I - well, I followed.
I might as well be here as anywhere else, and I felt a wish to see you.«
    »Why should you wish to see me? What does it matter to you whether I am well
or ill?«
    »Yes, it matters, though of course you find it hard to believe.«
    »Very, when I remember the words with which you last parted from me. If I
was hateful to you then, how am I less so now?«
    »A man in anger, and especially one of my nature, often says more than he
means. It was never you that were hateful to me, though your beliefs and your
circumstances might madden me into saying such a thing.«
    »My beliefs, as I told you then, are a part of myself - are myself.«
    She said it with irritable insistence - an accent which would doubtless have
been significant in the ears of Eleanor Spence.
    »I don't wish to speak of that. Have you recovered your health, Miriam?«
    »I am better.«
    He came nearer again, throwing his hat aside.
    »Will you let me sit down? I've had a long journey in third-class, and I
feel tired. Such weather as this doesn't help to make me cheerful. I imagined
Naples with a rather different sky.«
    Miriam motioned towards a chair, and looked drearily from the window at the
dreary sea. Neither spoke again for two or three minutes. Reuben Elgar surveyed
the room, but inattentively.
    »What is it you want of me?« Miriam asked, facing him abruptly.
    »Want? You hint that I have come to ask you for money?«
    »I shouldn't have thought it impossible. If you were in need - you spoke of
a
