ll about it?"

"Do you promise not to be angry with me, Iris?" he answered, in his
deep, musical voice. "You know I can not help old adages--I do not make
them."

"Why should I be angry?" she exclaimed, having a rather faint idea of
what was coming.

"Well, then," said Kendal, fixing his dark eyes full upon her, "it is
said that the youth and maiden who twine the ruby and golden leaves
together are intended for each other. There, are you so very angry?"

Iris dropped his arm with a little cry, and fled precipitately into the
house.

He walked on slowly through the great hall and into the library. He knew
Dorothy would be waiting for him, and he did not feel equal to the
ordeal of meeting her just then.

He wanted a moment to think. He felt that he was standing on the brink
of a fearful abyss, and that one more step must prove fatal to him.

Which way should he turn? He was standing face to face with the terrible
truth now, that he loved Iris Vincent madly--loved her better than his
own life--he, the betrothed of another.

But with that knowledge came another. Iris could be nothing to him, for
they were both poor.

He was sensible enough to sit down and look the future in the face. He
realized that if he should marry Iris on the spur of the moment, that
would be only the beginning of the end.

It would be all gay and bright with them for a few brief weeks, or
perhaps for a few months; then their sky would change, for Iris was not
a girl to endure poverty for love's sake. She wanted the luxuries of
life--these he could not give her; and there would be reproaches from
the lips that now had only smiles for him.

She would want diamonds and silks, and all the other feminine
extravagances so dear to the hearts of other women, and he was only a
struggling doctor, who would have to fight a hand-to-hand battle with
grim poverty. And sitting there in the arm-chair, before the glowing
grate, where he had flung himself, he pictured a life of poverty that
would spread out before him if he defied the world for love's sake.

A dingy office; a worn coat, and trousers shiny at the knees; a necktie
with a ragged edge; an unkempt beard, a last season's hat, and hunger
gnawing at his vitals.

The picture filled him with the most abject horror.

He was stylish and fastidious to a fault. He loved Iris; but did he not
equally love his own ease? He could barely tolerate Dorothy, the poor,
tender, plain little creature who lav