roke out. "It cannot be--you cannot
think--you do not know him!"

"I know very little of your father's theories, Miss Brownell,"
protested Palmerston. "You cannot blame me if I question them; you seem
to question them yourself."

"His theories--I loathe them!" She spoke with angry emphasis. "It is not
that; it is himself. I cannot bear to think that you--that any one"--

"Pardon me," interrupted Palmerston; "we were speaking of his theories.
I have no desire to discuss your father."

He knew his tone was resentful. He found himself wondering whether it
was an excess of egotism or of humility that made her ignore his
personality.

"Why should we not discuss him?" she asked, turning her straightforward
eyes upon him.

"Because"--Palmerston broke into an impatient laugh--"because we are not
disembodied spirits; at least, I am not."

The girl gave him a look of puzzled incomprehension, and turned back to
her own thoughts. That they were troubled thoughts her face gave
abundant evidence. Palmerston waited curiously eager for some
manifestation of social grace, some comment on the scenery which should
lead by the winding path of young-ladyism to the Mecca of her personal
tastes and preferences; should unveil that sacred estimate of herself
which she so gladly shared with others, but which others too often
failed to share with her.

"I wish you would tell me all you know about it," she said presently,
"this proposition my father has made. He writes me very indefinitely,
and sometimes it is hard for me to learn, even when I am with him, just
what he is doing. He forgets that he has not told me."

The young man hesitated, weighing the difficulties that would beset him
if he should attempt to explain his hesitation, seeing also the more
tangible difficulties of evasion if she should turn her clear eyes upon
him. It would be better for Dysart if she knew, he said to himself. They
had made no secret of the transaction, and sooner or later she must hear
of it from others, if not from her father. He yielded to the infection
of her candor, and told her what she asked. She listened with knitted
brows and an introspective glance.

"Mr. Dysart might lose his work," she commented tentatively.

Palmerston was silent.

The girl turned abruptly. "Could he lose anything else?" The color swept
across her face, and her voice had a half-pathetic menace in it.

"Every business arrangement is uncertain, contains a possibility of
l