ally or unintentionally, seemed destined to bring shipwreck
into three lives.

"It was not the last time I heard that sigh. As the weeks progressed it
fluttered oftener and oftener from between those pale lips, and at last
the change in Miss Dudleigh became so marked that people stopped in the
midst of their talk about the stamp act to remark upon Miss Dudleigh's
growing weakness, and venture assertions that she would never live to be
a bride. And yet the preparations for her bridal and for mine went on,
and the day set apart for the latter drew bewilderingly near.

"Marah saw my perplexity and her cousin's grief, but did nothing to
dispel the one or assuage the other. She seemed to be too busy. She was
embroidering a famous stomacher for herself, and while a sprig of it
remained unworked she had neither eyes nor attention for anything else,
even for the bleeding hearts around her. She would smile--O yes, smile
upon me, smile upon Honora, and not smile upon him; but she would not
meet her cousin's true eyes, nor would she grant me one minute apart
from the rest in which I could utter my fears or demand the breaking of
that spell whose effects were so visible, even if its workings were
secret and imperceptible. But at last the stomacher was finished, and as
it dropped from her hands I threw myself at her feet, and from this
position, looking into her eyes, I whispered:

"'This is the last thing that shall ever flaunt itself between us. You
are to be mine now, and in token of your truth come with me into the
conservatory, for I have words to utter that will not be put off.'

"'You are cruel,' she murmured, 'you are tyrannical. This is a time of
revolt; shall I revolt, too?'

"Maddened, for her eyes were not looking at me, but at him, I leaped to
my feet, and, regardless of everything but my determination to end this
uncertainty then and there, I lifted her and carried her out of the room
into another, where I could have her alone, and without the humiliating
sense of his presence.

[Illustration]

"My bold act seemed to frighten her, for she stood very still where I
had placed her, only trembling slightly when I looked at her and
cried:

"'Did you ask that question of me? Am I to understand you want to break
your fetters?'

"She plucked a rose from her breast and crumpled it to atoms between her
hands.

"'O why are they not golden ones!' she asked. 'I am miserable because we
must be poor; because--because I w