ou to say. I should advise going to your
father's house. That I am sure is what will please him best. He is your
natural refuge at such a time as this. If, however, you shrink from
appearing before the eyes of the village gossips in your native town, I
will take you to the home of a dear old friend of mine, hidden among the
quiet hills, where you will be cared for most royally and tenderly for my
sake, and where you can work out your life problem in the way that seems
best to you. It is there that I am planning to take you to-night. We can
easily reach there before evening if we start at once."

Marcia started to her feet in horror.

"What do you mean?" she stammered in a choking voice. "I could never go
anywhere with you Mr. Temple. You are a bad man! You have been telling me
lies! I do not believe one word of what you have said. My husband is noble
and good. If he did any of those things you say he did he had a reason for
it. I shall never distrust him."

Marcia's head was up grandly now and her voice had come back. She looked
the man in the eye until he quailed, but still he sought to hold his power
over her.

"You poor child!" and his voice was gentleness and forbearance itself. "I
do not wonder in your first horror and surprise that you feel as you do. I
anticipated this. Sit down and calm yourself and let me tell you more
about it. I can prove everything that I have said. I have letters here----"
and he swept his hand toward a pile of letters lying on the table; Miranda
in the closet marked well the position of those letters. "All that I have
said is only too true, I am sorry to say, and you must listen to me----"

Marcia interrupted him, her eyes blazing, her face excited: "Mr. Temple, I
shall not listen to another word you say. You are a wicked man and I was
wrong to come here at all. You deceived me or I should not have come. I
must go home at once." With that she started toward the door.

Harry Temple flung aside the shawl that covered his sometime sprained
ankle and arose quickly, placing himself before her, forgetful of his
invalid role:

"Not so fast, my pretty lady," he said, grasping her wrists fiercely in
both his hands. "You need not think to escape so easily. You shall not
leave this room except in my company. Do you not know that you are in my
power? You have spent nearly an hour alone in my bedchamber, and what will
your precious husband have to do with you after this is known?"