"You look so pleasantly and kindly, that you must be thinking of
Mr. Eltinge," said Van Berg.
"You are not to paint my thoughts," said Ida, with a quick flush.
"I wish I could."
"I'm glad you can't."
"You do puzzle one, Miss Mayhew. On the day of our visit to the old garden your thoughts seemed as clear to me as the water of the little brook, and I supposed I saw all that was in your mind. But before the day was over I felt that I did not understand you at all."
"Mr. Van Berg, I'm astonished you are an artist."
"Because of the character of my work?"
"No, indeed. But such a wonderful taste for solving problems suggests a metaphysician. I think you would become discouraged with such tasks. Just think how many ladies there are in the world, and I'm sure any one of them is a more abstruse problem than I am."
The artist looked up at her in surprise and bit his lip with a faint trace of embarrassment, but he said, after a moment, "But it does not follow that they are interesting problems."
"You don't know," she replied.