me from trying to make her my own. That resolve must
have shown in my face--it or the passion that inspired it--for she paused
and paled.

"What is it?" I asked. "Are you afraid of me?"

She came forward proudly, a fine scorn in her eyes. "No," she said. "But if
you knew, you might be afraid of me."

"I am," I confessed. "I am afraid of you because you inspire in me a
feeling that is beyond my control. I've committed many follies in my
life--I have moods in which it amuses me to defy fate. But those follies
have always been of my own willing. You"--I laughed--"you are a folly for
me. But one that compels me."

She smiled--not discouragingly--and seated herself on a tiny sofa in the
corner, a curiously impregnable intrenchment, as I noted--for my impulse
was to carry her by storm. I was astonished at my own audacity; I was
wondering where my fear of her had gone, my awe of her superior fineness
and breeding. "Mama will be down in a few minutes," she said.

"I didn't come to see your mother," replied I. "I came to see you."

She flushed, then froze--and I thought I had once more "got upon" her
nerves with my rude directness. How eagerly sensitive our nerves are to bad
impressions of one we don't like, and how coarsely insensible to bad
impressions of one we do like!

[Illustration]

"I see I've offended again, as usual," said I. "You attach so much
importance to petty little dancing-master tricks and caperings. You
live--always have lived--in an artificial atmosphere. Real things act on
you like fresh air on a hothouse flower."

"You are--fresh air?" she inquired, with laughing sarcasm.

"I am that," retorted I. "And good for you--as you'll find when you get
used to me."

I heard voices in the next room--her mother's and some man's. We waited
until it was evident we were not to be disturbed. As I realized that fact
and surmised its meaning, I looked triumphantly at her. She drew further
back into her corner, and the almost stern firmness of her contour told me
she had set her teeth.

"I see you are nerving yourself," said I with a laugh. "You are perfectly
certain I am going to propose to you."

She flamed scarlet and half-started up.

"Your mother--in the next room--expects it, too," I went on, laughing even
more disagreeably. "Your parents need money--they have decided to sell you,
their only large income-producing asset. And I am willing to buy. What do
you say?"

I was blocking her way out of the r