, 1915-10-14

seemed to hold a startled realization
that she had remembered with a re-
morseful conjunction. Since that
night he had not been at Rosewood.
Ranston had lighted a pine-knot In
the fireplace, and the walls were shud-
dering with crimson shadows. Her
hand was shielding her eyes, and as
she strove to fill the gaps in their
somewhat spasmod!c conversation
with the trivial im%personal things that
belonged to their old intimacy, the
tiny Pickering flames seemed to be
darling unfriendly fingers plucking at
her secret. Leaning from her nest OF
cushions she thrust h poker Into
the glowing resinous mass till sparks
whizzed up the chimney'e black NAV
in a torrent.
"How they iyl" she said. "Rickey
SNYDER calls 1t raising a blizzard in
Hades. 1 used to think they flew up
to the sky and became the httlest
stars. What a pity we have to grow
up and learn so much! I'd rather
have kept on believing that when the
red leave II the woods whirled about
in a circle the fairies were dancing,
and that it was the gnomes who put
the cockle-burs In the hounds ears"
She had peer talking at random,
gradually becoming shrinkingly con
scious of his constrained and STUN
bling manner She had, however, but
half defined his errand when he came
to 1t all in a burst.
IL can't get to 1t, somehow, Shir-
! ley" he said with sudden desperation,
but here 1t Is. I've come to ask you
to marry me. Don't stop me-" he
went on hurriedly, lifting his hand:
whatever you say | must tell you.
I've been trying to for months and
months!" Now that he had started,
It came with a boyish vehemence that
both chilled and thrilled her. Even
in her own desolation, and shrinking
almost unbearably from the avowal,
the hope and brightness in his voice
touched her with pity. 1t seemed to
her-that life was a strange tumble of
unacceptable and incomprehensible
pain. And all the while, in the young
voice vibrant with feeling, her cring-
ing ear was catching imagined echoes
of that other voice, graver and more
self-contained, but shaken by the same
passion, in that iteration OF 4 love
you! l love you'll"
His answer came to him finally in
her silence. and he released her hands
which he had caught in his own. They
dropped, limp and u~nresponsive, in
her lap. Shirley" he said brokenly,
maybe you can't care for me-yet.
But If you will marry me, I'm be
content with so little, tin-you do"
She shook her head, her hair max
ing dim flashes in the freight. mo.
Chilly" she saiu. 1T makes me
wretched to give you pain, but ! must
i must! Love isn't like that. 1t
doesn't come a%fterward. ! know. /
could never give you what you want.
You would end by despising me, as
I-should despise myself"
81 won't give up" he said incoher-
emily. 81 can't give up. Not so long
as know there's nobody else. At the
ball l thought thought perhaps you
cared for Valiant-but since he told
ne"
He stopped suddenly, for she was
looking at him from an ashen face.
Ii told me there was no reason why
l should not try my luck" he said diff
acultly. 81 asked him."
There was a silence, while he gazed
at her, breathing despair. Then he
tried to laugh.
All right" he said hoarsely. Tt
1t doesn't matter. Don't worry"
She stretched out her hand to him
In a gesture of wistful pain, and he
hnlH ~ u HnNraa-N L-4-.--- "
his, then released 1t and went hur-
riedly out.
AS the door closed, Shirley sat
down, her head dropping into her
hands like a storm-broken flower. Val
liant had accepted the fnality of the
situation. With a wave of deeper
hopelessness than had yet submerged
her, she realized that, against her own
decision, something deep within her
had taken shy n secret comfort In
his stubborn masculine refusal.
Against all fact, in face of the impos-
sible, her heart had been clinging to
this-as though his love might even
attain the miraculous and somewhere,
somehow. recreate circumstance. But
now he. too, had bowed to the decree.
A kin of utter apathetic wretched-
ness seized upon her. to replace the
sharp misery that had 80 long been
her companion-an empty numbness
in which. in a measure. she ceased to
feel.
An hour dragged slowly by and at
length she rose and went slowly up
the stairs. Her head felt curiously
heavy, but 1t did not ache. Outside
her mothers door. as was her custom,
she paused mechanically to listen. A
tiny pencil of light struck through the
darkness and painted a spot of bright
ness on her gown. II came through
the keyhole; the lamp in her mothers