“Do you find Hilltop much changed, Mr. Lee?”
“I find myself changed,” answered Vickers. He had no intention of losing any of the advantages of his position, nor was he going until he had drawn her back to a more friendly tone. “You see I have been living among another people. Did it ever strike you, Miss Overton, what is the distinguishing trait of the Anglo-Saxon race?”
Miss Overton, who was not quite sure what the Anglo-Saxon race was, answered that it had not.
“Why, their ability to pick out another person’s duty. Ever since I’ve been here every one has been telling me what my duty is—except you.”
“But isn’t that a help, sometimes, Mr. Lee?” the girl asked shyly. She had heard that her visitor was sometimes in need of a little advice in this matter.
“Ah, but how do they know my duty, Miss Overton? They all think they do; but do they? There are so many different kinds of duty, just as there are so many different kinds of virtue.”
“But are there many?” asked Miss Overton, trying to think how many she had learned there were at school. Was it nine virtues, or nine Muses? She was sure about the seven deadly sins.
“Oh, all sorts and kinds. I had a servant once in Central America, who was the kindest little chap to animals. When my macaw was ill, he insisted on sitting up all night with it, and yet I found out afterward that just before he came to me he had murdered his mother and grandmother, because he said they nagged him.”
“What an interesting life you must have had, Mr. Lee,” said the girl, for this casual mention of crimes was startling to Hilltop notions.
“And courage is a queer thing,” Vickers went on; “I knew a native down there who cried when an American knocked him down, and yet when it came to sheer crazy courage——”