ons. We are still ourselves: you, rich;
I, a penniless adventuress. I could not accept you when you asked me at
Schlangenbad. On just the same grounds, I cannot accept you now. I do
not see how the unessential fact that I made myself into a winch to pull
you up the cliff, and that I am still smarting for it----'

He looked me all over comically. 'How severe we are!' he cried, in a
bantering tone. 'And how extremely Girtony! A System of Logic,
Ratiocinative and Inductive, by Lois Cayley! What a pity we didn't take
a professor's chair. My child that isn't _you_! It's not yourself at
all! It's an attempt to be unnaturally and unfemininely reasonable.'

Logic fled. I broke down utterly. 'Harold,' I cried, rising, 'I love
you! I admit I love you! But I will never marry you--while you have
those thousands.'

'I haven't got them yet!'

'Or the chance of inheriting them.'

He smothered my hand with kisses--for I withdrew my face. 'If you admit
you love me,' he cried, quite joyously, 'then all is well. When once a
woman admits that, the rest is but a matter of time--and, Lois, I can
wait a thousand years for you.'

'Not in my case,' I answered through my tears. 'Not in my case, Harold!
I am a modern woman, and what I say I mean. I will renew my promise. If
ever you are poor and friendless, come to me; I am yours. Till then,
don't harrow me by asking me the impossible!'

I tore myself away. At the hall door, Lady Georgina intercepted me. She
glanced at my red eyes. 'Then you have taken him?' she cried, seizing my
hand.

I shook my head firmly. I could hardly speak. 'No, Lady Georgina,' I
answered, in a choking voice. 'I have refused him again. I will not
stand in his way. I will not ruin his prospects.'

She drew back and let her chin drop. 'Well, of all the hard-hearted,
cruel, obdurate young women I ever saw in my born days, if you're not
the very hardest----'

[Illustration]

I half ran from the house. I hurried home to the _chalet_. There, I
dashed into my own room, locked the door behind me, flung myself wildly
on my bed, and, burying my face in my hands, had a good, long,
hard-hearted, cruel, obdurate cry--exactly like any other mediaeval
woman. It's all very well being modern; but my experience is that, when
it comes to a man one loves--well, the Middle Ages are still horribly
strong within us.

VI

THE ADVENTURE OF THE URBANE OLD GENTLEMAN

When Elsie's holidays--I beg pardon, vacation--came to