hat you would marry me. What do the French call it,--_mariage de
convenance_?"

Her voice was even, and her head was bent so that he could not see her
face. In the pause that followed her words treetop whispered to treetop,
but the sunshine lay very still and bright upon the road and upon the
flowers by the wayside.

"There are worse marriages," Haward said at last. Rising from the log, he
moved to the side of the kneeling figure. "Let the violets rest, Evelyn,
while we reason together. You are too clear-eyed. Since they offend you,
I will drop the idle compliments, the pretty phrases, in which neither of
us believes. What if this tinted dream of love does not exist for us? What
if we are only friends--dear and old friends"--

He stooped, and, taking her by the busy hands, made her stand up beside
him. "Cannot we marry and still be friends?" he demanded, with something
like laughter in his eyes. "My dear, I would strive to make you happy; and
happiness is as often found in that temperate land where we would dwell as
in Love's flaming climate." He smiled and tried to find her eyes, downcast
and hidden in the shadow of her hat. "This is no flowery wooing such as
women love," he said; "but then you are like no other woman. Always the
truth was best with you."

Upon her wrenching her hands from his, and suddenly and proudly raising
her head, he was amazed to find her white to the lips.

"The truth!" she said slowly. "Always the truth was best! Well, then, take
the truth, and afterwards and forever and ever leave me alone! You have
been frank; why should not I, who, you say, am like no other woman, be so,
too? I will not marry you, because--because"--The crimson flowed over her
face and neck; then ebbed, leaving her whiter than before. She put her
hands, that still held the wild flowers, to her breast, and her eyes, dark
with pain, met his. "Had you loved me," she said proudly and quietly, "I
had been happy."

[Illustration: "HAD YOU LOVED ME--I HAD BEEN HAPPY"]

Haward stepped backwards until there lay between them a strip of sunny
earth. The murmur of the wind went on and the birds were singing, and yet
the forest seemed more quiet than death. "I could not guess," he said,
speaking slowly and with his eyes upon the ground. "I have spoken like a
brute. I beg your pardon."

"You might have known! you might have guessed!" she cried, with passion.
"But, you walk an even way; you choose nor high nor low; you look deep