y.

"May as well what--dearest?" he asked.

She shook an obstinate head.

"You don't love me," was her inevitable feminine challenge.

He laughed again. "Do I love you?" he demanded as he looked at her.

She did not answer, but the shade of Amos Burr melted afar.

Nicholas bent over her with abrupt intensity and kissed her lips until
his kisses hurt her.

"Do I love you--now?" he asked.

"Yes--yes--yes." She freed herself with a laugh that dispelled the
lingering cloud. "You may convince me next time without violence," she
affirmed radiantly.

As he watched her his large nostrils twitched whimsically. "You were
saying that we might as well--"

"Go home to supper," she finished triumphantly. "The sun has set."

When she left him a little later at the end of the avenue she flew
joyously up the narrow walk. She was softly humming to herself, and as
she stepped upon the porch the song ran lightly into words.

"I love Love, though he has wings,
And like light can flee--"

she sang, and paused within the shadow of the porch to glance through
the long window that led into the sitting-room. The heavy curtains
obstructed her gaze, and she had put up her hand to push them aside,
when her father's voice reached her, and at his words her outstretched
arm fell slowly to her side.

"It's that girl of Jerry Pollard's," he was saying. "She's gotten into
trouble, and that Burr boy's mixed up in it; the young rascal!"

Miss Chris's placid voice floated in.

"I can't believe it," she charitably murmured; and Bernard, who was on
the hearth rug, turned at the sound.

"It's all gossip, you know," he said.

Eugenia pushed aside the curtains and stepped into the room. Her hands
hung at her sides, and the animation had faded from her glance. Her face
looked white and drawn.

"It is not true," she said steadily. "Papa, it is not true."

"I--I'm afraid it is, daughter," gasped the general. There was an
abashed embarrassment in his attitude and his hands shook. He had hoped
to keep such facts beyond the utmost horizon of his daughter's life.

Eugenia crossed to the hearth rug and stood looking into Bernard's
face. She made an appealing gesture with her hands.

"Bernard, it is not true," she said.

He turned away from her and, nervously lifting the poker, divided the
smouldering log. A red flame shot up, illuminating the gathered faces
that stood out against the dusk. The glare lent a grotesque irony to the
flabb