Twenty years had not come and gone without leaving
plenty of traces on me. We neither of us ever mentioned Janet, _my_
Janet, that is to say. Janet's daughter (Janet II., as I used to
mentally designate her for convenience' sake) was here as I expected,
and for a while, just as before, I did not take to her. I left her alone
and she left me alone; that was her way.
She was lovely, certainly; ethereally lovely; almost too lovely for
one's senses to grasp the fact that she was but common flesh and blood
like all the rest of the world: a poem in human form if there ever was
one. Gossip had spoken truly for once; there were the three
distinguished lovers, and goodness knows how many more besides.
Paul and I never spoke of this girl, any more than we did of my Janet;
but, at first, I often fancied I saw his gaze fastened on her; the same
unpleasant sneer on his lips which disfigured them when he looked at
Duncan. By and by I grew rather to like her. I believe I, at heart,
resented Paul looking like that at my Janet's bairn. I began to fancy
that, for all her apparent calmness, she was shy. If we met in the
garden she would give me a swift glance to see if I were going to stop
and speak to her, and, I thought, seemed pleased when I did. At last
there came an odd little episode.
Paul was very fond of animals--that was always one of his good
traits--and he one day found a little stray white kitten somewhere about
the place, and brought it into the room where I sat alone at work.
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