orld over. Silly things, always, and
never interesting company for other people. How long before Mr. Trevlyn
is coming for you?"

Margie consulted her watch.

"At eight. It is now seven. In an hour."

"In an hour! An hour's time! Long enough to change the destiny of
empires!"

"How strangely you talk, Alexandrine! What spirit possesses you?" asked
Margie, filled, in spite of herself, with a curious premonition of evil.

Alexandrine sat down by the side of her friend, and looked searchingly
into her face, her great black eyes holding Margie with a sort of
serpent-like fascination.

"Margaret, you love this Archer Trevlyn very dearly do you not?"

Margie blushed crimson, but she answered, proudly:

"Why need I be ashamed to confess it? I do. I love him with my whole
soul!"

"And you do not think there is in you any possibility of a change?"

"A change! What do you mean? Explain yourself."

"You do not think the time will ever come when you will cease to love Mr.
Arthur Trevlyn?"

"It will never come!" Margie replied, indignantly, "never, while I have
my reason!"

"Do you believe in love's immortality?"

"I believe that all true love is changeless as eternity! I am not a
child, Alexandrine, to be blown about by every passing breeze."

"No, you are a woman now, with a woman's capability of suffering. You
ought, also, to be possessed of woman's resolution of a woman's strength
to endure sorrow and affliction."

"I have never had any great affliction, Alexandrine. The death of Mr.
Linmere was horrible to me, but it was not as if I had loved him; and
though I loved Mr. Trevlyn, my guardian, he died so peacefully, that I
cannot wish him back. And my dear parents--I was so young then, and they
were so willing to go! No, I do not think I have ever had any great
sorrow, such as blast people's whole lifetimes."

"But you think you will always continue to love Archer Trevlyn?"

"How strangely you harp on that string! What do you mean? There is
something behind all this; I see it in your face. You frighten me!"

"Margie, all people are blind sometimes, but more especially women, when
they love. Would it be a mercy to open the eyes of one who, in happy
ignorance, was walking over a precipice which the flowers hid from her
view?"

Margie shuddered, and the beautiful color fled from her cheek.

"I do not comprehend you. Why do you keep me in suspense?"

"Because I dread to break the charm. You will hate me fo