, dear, darling child.'

Gladys sat up, and her wet eyes met those of her kind friend, who had
allowed her upright and womanly heart to take the right, if the
unworldly side.

'Just think how merciful it was of God to let me know in time. In a few
weeks I should have been his wife, and then it would have been
terrible.'

'It would,' said Mrs. Fordyce, with a sigh; 'but you would just have had
to bury it, and live on, as many other women have to do, with such
skeletons in the cupboard.'

'I don't suppose I should have died, but I should have lived the rest of
my life apart from him. Is it true what he says, that so many are bad? I
cannot believe it.'

'Nor do I. There are some, I know, who have had an unworthy past, but
you must remember that all women do not look at moral questions from
your exalted standpoint. There are even girls, like Julia, for instance,
who admire men who are a little fast.'

'How dreadful! That must lower the morality of men. It shall never be
said of me. If I cannot marry a man who entertains a high and reverent
ideal of manhood and womanhood, I shall die as I am.'

'He will be difficult to find, my dear,' said Mrs. Fordyce sadly. 'This
is a melancholy end to all our high hopes and ambitions. It will be a
frightful blow to them at Pollokshields.'

'I am not sorry for them. They will think only of what the world will
say, and will never give poor Lizzie one kindly thought. If it is a
blow, they deserve it; I am not sorry for them at all.'

'And you are not in the least disconcerted at the nine days' wonder the
breaking of your engagement will make?'

'Not in the least. What is it, after all? The buzzing of a few idle
flies. I have no room for anything in my heart but a vast pity for the
poor dead girl who was more sinned against than sinning, and a profound
thankfulness to God for His unspeakable mercy to me.'

She spoke the truth; and in her own home that night, upon her knees, she
poured forth her heart in fervent prayer, and mingling with her many
strange feelings was a strange and unutterable sense of relief, because
she was once more free.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XLVI.

THE WORLD WELL LOST.

Gladys returned to her own home that night, and when she again left it
it was in altered and happy circumstances. Those who loved her so dearly
watched over her the next days with a tender and solicitous concern, but
they did not see much, in her outward demeanour at least, to