tle smile. "Oh, forgive me, please! I didn't mean to say that.
I don't want to have you tell me so. It's all too ridiculous and
impossible."

"Is it? And why?"

"I have only known you for three days."

"We can make up for that."

"But I don't--care about you. I have never thought of any one in that
way. It is absurd," she went on.

"You'll have to, sometime or other," he declared. "I'll take you
travelling with me, show you the world, new worlds, unnamed rivers,
untrodden mountains. Or do you want to go and see where the little brown
people live among the mimosa and the cherry blossoms? I'll take you so
far away that this place and this life will seem like a dream."

Her breath caught a little.

"Don't, please," she begged. "You know very well--or rather you don't
know, perhaps, but I must tell you--that I couldn't. I am here, tied and
bound, and I can't escape."

"Ah! dear, don't believe it," he went on earnestly. "There isn't any
bond so strong that I won't break it for you, no knot I won't untie, if
you give me the right."

They were climbing slowly on to the tee. He stepped forward and pulled
her up. Her hand was cold. Her eyes were raised to his, very softly yet
almost pleadingly.

"Please don't say anything more," she begged. "I can't--quite bear it
just now. You know, you must remember--there is my mother. Do you think
that I could leave her to struggle alone?"

His caddy, who had teed the ball, and who had regarded the proceedings
with a moderately tolerant air, felt called upon at last to interfere.

"We'd best get on," he remarked, pointing to two figures in the
distance, "or they'll say we've cut in."

Hamel smote his ball far and true. On a more moderate scale she followed
his example. They descended the steps together.

"Love-making isn't going to spoil our golf," he whispered, smiling, as
he touched her fingers once more.

She looked at him almost shyly.

"Is this love-making?" she asked.

They walked together from the eighteenth green towards the club-house.
A curious silence seemed suddenly to have enveloped them. Hamel was
conscious of a strange exhilaration, a queer upheaval of ideas, an
excitement which nothing in his previous life had yet been able to yield
him. The wonder of it amazed him, kept him silent. It was not until they
reached the steps, indeed, that he spoke.

"On our way home--" he began.

She seemed suddenly to have stiffened. He looked at her, surprised. She
wa