at to say.

"I had never thought that you cared for me in any such way," she told
him. "I have looked upon you always as a very dear friend. I shall
not give you my answer now. Forget that you have asked me to be your
wife. Let us go on as we have been--then I can consider you from an
entirely different angle for a time. It may be that I shall discover
that my feeling for you is more than friendship. I certainly have not
thought for a moment that I loved you."

This arrangement was perfectly satisfactory to Monsieur Thuran. He
deeply regretted that he had been hasty, but he had loved her for so
long a time, and so devotedly, that he thought that every one must know
it.

"From the first time I saw you, Hazel," he said, "I have loved you. I
am willing to wait, for I am certain that so great and pure a love as
mine will be rewarded. All that I care to know is that you do not love
another. Will you tell me?"

"I have never been in love in my life," she replied, and he was quite
satisfied. On the way home that night he purchased a steam yacht, and
built a million-dollar villa on the Black Sea.

The next day Hazel Strong enjoyed one of the happiest surprises of her
life--she ran face to face upon Jane Porter as she was coming out of a
jeweler's shop.

"Why, Jane Porter!" she exclaimed. "Where in the world did you drop
from? Why, I can't believe my own eyes."

"Well, of all things!" cried the equally astonished Jane. "And here I
have been wasting whole reams of perfectly good imagination picturing
you in Baltimore--the very idea!" And she threw her arms about her
friend once more, and kissed her a dozen times.

By the time mutual explanations had been made Hazel knew that Lord
Tennington's yacht had put in at Cape Town for at least a week's stay,
and at the end of that time was to continue on her voyage--this time up
the West Coast--and so back to England. "Where," concluded Jane, "I am
to be married."

"Then you are not married yet?" asked Hazel.

"Not yet," replied Jane, and then, quite irrelevantly, "I wish England
were a million miles from here."

Visits were exchanged between the yacht and Hazel's relatives. Dinners
were arranged, and trips into the surrounding country to entertain the
visitors. Monsieur Thuran was a welcome guest at every function. He
gave a dinner himself to the men of the party, and managed to
ingratiate himself in the good will of Lord Tennington by many little
acts o