tly to the room Marie had formerly occupied,
without the slightest idea that Beth had lived in the house with him
nearly two months. It was strange, but though he had seen all the other
girls in the house he had never seen Beth. He had not enquired her
address the year before, not wishing to know. He wished to have nothing
to do with Clarence Mayfair's promised wife. She was nothing to him.
Should he encourage the love he felt for another's wife? No! He had
loved with all the strength of that love that comes but once to any
human heart, and he had suffered as only the strong and silent can
suffer; but he had resolved to bury his pain, and it had given his face
a sterner look. So he lay down to rest that night all unconscious that
Beth was in the room just overhead; that he had heard her footsteps
daily, even listened to her humming little airs to unrecognizable tunes;
but the sight of Clarence Mayfair had aroused the past, and he did not
sleep till late.

The following afternoon, as Beth sat studying in her room after
lectures, she heard a faint tap at her door, a timid knock that in some
way seemed to appeal strangely to her. She opened the door--and there
stood Marie! In the first moment of her surprise Beth forgot everything
that had separated them, and threw both arms about her in the old
child-like way. She seated her in the rocker by the window and they
talked of various things for a while, but Beth noticed, now and then,
an uneasy look in her eyes.

"She has come to tell me she is going to marry Clarence, and she finds
it difficult, poor girl," thought Beth, with a heart full of sympathy.

"Beth," said Marie at last, "I have wronged you. I have come here to ask
you to forgive me."

Beth belonged to the kind of people who are always silent in
emergencies, so she only looked at her with her great tender eyes, in
which there was no trace of resentment.

"I came between you and Clarence Mayfair. He never loved me. It was only
a fancy. I amused and interested him, I suppose. That was all. He is
true to you in the depths of his heart, Beth. It was my fault--all my
fault. He never loved me. It was you he loved, but I encouraged him. It
was wrong, I know."

Something seemed to choke her for a moment.

"Will you forgive me, Beth? Can you ever forgive?"

She was leaning forward gracefully, her fur cape falling back from her
shoulders and her dark eyes full of tears.

Beth threw both arms about her old friend ten