loved her, Maggie
Windsor? Ah, no; she remembered Mrs. Carey, and said nothing.

"Miss Windsor--Maggie," he said, "I know that I have no right to ask you
to marry me, save that I love you with a single heart."

"Oh, Mr. Doubleface," she thought, "how fair you talk!" She still said
nothing, but tapped the stone in front of her nervously with the end of
her little boot.

"I have nothing to offer you," continued Geoffrey, "except my love and
my name; I do not even know whether I even have a life to give you."

Maggie was startled by this; she did not understand it at all. Geoffrey
waited for her to say something, and there was a depressing pause for a
moment.

She felt that she had grown pale, and her fingers twitched convulsively
at the handle of her parasol. Here was her lover saying to her all that
she had dreamed he might say, saying in an earnest, trembling voice that
he loved her; in a voice so different to his customary tone of banter,
that she for a moment almost believed in his sincerity; yet as she
averted her face and looked over the bay she could see clearly in her
mind's eye the little picture which had remained in it from
yesterday--her lover holding Mrs. Carey in his arms.

"Lord Brompton," she finally said, in a slow, deliberate voice, from
which all passion, even all affection was wanting, "I am sorry that you
have spoken to me in this way, very sorry."

Poor Geoffrey had expected a different answer, and as he sat there
looking at Maggie's pale, agitated face, he felt that there was a wall
between them, where he had always found a kindly sympathy and an
affectionate interest before. He had expected, perhaps, that she might
not care about him enough to marry him, for he was not so young or
conceited as to imagine that the priceless treasure of a woman's heart
is to be lightly won at the first asking, but he had thought that his
sweetheart would sympathize with him at his loss of her; with the
touching pity which at such times is so akin to love and often its
forerunner. Still he boldly went on with his declaration, feeling that
he did not wish to leave a word unsaid of all that had swelled his heart
with love and hope. If his love were all poured out and spurned, would
not the chambers of his heart be swept and garnished for the future?

Yet what a desolate, haunted chamber it will be, he bitterly thought.

"I could not have told you a week ago that I loved you, Maggie," he
said. "But I did, thou