She shut her lips.
"I shall not take it."
"It will make you stronger," I insisted.
"You can do nothing," she answered, coldly, "to make me stronger than I am."
IX
A SERIOUS MATTER
I
f ever woman had a tender heart, that heart was Dove's. I used to say, to her confusion, that a South Sea cannibal might find confessional in her gentle ear, were his voice but low enough; that she might draw back, shuddering at his tales of the bones he had picked, but if only his tears were real ones, I could imagine her, when he had done, putting her hand upon his swarthy shoulder and saying, earnestly: