is utterly consumed.

"Perhaps you would rather I went away," says Mr. Branscombe, stiffly,
seeing she will not speak. He is staring at her, and is apparently
hopelessly affronted.

"Well, perhaps I would," returns she, coolly, without condescending to
look at him.

"Good-by,"--icily.

"Good-by,"--in precisely the same tone, and without changing her
position half an inch.

Branscombe turns away with a precipitancy that plainly betokens hot
haste to be gone. He walks quickly in the home direction, and gets as
far as the curve in the glen without once looking back. So far the hot
haste lasts, and is highly successful; then it grows cooler; the first
deadly heat dies away, and, as it goes, his steps grow slower and
still slower. A severe struggle with pride ensues, in which pride goes
to the wall, and then he comes to a standstill.

Though honestly disgusted with his own want of firmness, he turns and
gazes fixedly at the small white-gowned figure standing, just as he
had left her, among the purple bells.

Yet not exactly as he had left her: her lips are twitching now, her
lids have fallen over her eyes. Even as he watches, the soft lips
part, and a smile comes to them,--an open, irrepressible smile, that
deepens presently into a gay, mischievous laugh, that rings sweetly,
musically upon the air.

It is too much. In a moment he is beside her again, and is gazing down
on her with angry eyes.

"Something is amusing you," he says. "Is it me?"

"Yes," says the spoiled beauty, moving back from him, and lifting her
lids from her laughing eyes to cast upon him a defiant glance.

"I dare say I do amuse you," exclaims he, wrathfully, goaded to
deeper anger by the mockery of her regard. "I have no doubt you
can find enjoyment in the situation, but I cannot! I dare
say"--passionately--"you think it capital fun to make me fall in love
with you,--to play with my heart until you can bind me hand and foot
as your slave,--only to fling me aside and laugh at my absurd
infatuation when the game has grown old and flavorless."

He has taken her hand whether she will or not, and, I think, at this
point, almost unconsciously, he gives her a gentle but very decided
little shake.

"But there is a limit to all things," he goes on, vehemently, "and
here, now, at this moment, you shall give me a plain answer to a plain
question I am going to ask you."

He has grown very pale, and his nostrils are slightly dilated. She has
grown