howed me so plainly that you still liked my
society, even after you had plighted your troth to another, I clung to
the mad idea that there was yet hope for me, if we were far away from
those who might come between us. On this lone island we will be all the
world to each other--'the world forgetting, by the world forgot.' Marry
me, Gerelda, and I will be your veritable slave!"

He never forgot the look she turned upon him.

"When your anger has had time to cool, you will forgive me, my darling,"
he pleaded, "and then I am sure you will not say me nay when I beg for
your heart and hand. I shall not force you into a marriage. I will wait
patiently until you come to me and say: 'Robert, I am willing to marry
you!'"

He remembered how she had turned from him in bitter anger and scorn too
terrible for any words. He had given her over into the hands of Marie,
the little French maid.

She offered no resistance as the girl took her hand and led her into the
house; but there was a look on her face that boded no good, while the
words she had uttered rang in his ears: "I shall never speak again until
you set me free!"

Twice she had made the attempt, during the forty-eight hours which
followed, to take her own life, and both times he had prevented her.
Even in those thrilling moments she had never uttered a word. She kept
her vow, and Captain Frazier was beside himself at the turn affairs had
taken.

But what else could he have done, under the circumstances? He could not
stand by and see her made the bride of another.

Only that day, by the merest chance, Frazier had found out about Hubert
Varrick practically adopting the village beauty--saucy little Jessie
Bain--and that he had secretly sent her to a private school, to be
educated at his own expense, and he lost no time in communicating this
startling news to Gerelda, and giving her proof positive of the truth of
this statement.

He saw her face turn deathly white, and he knew that the arrow of bitter
jealousy had struck home; but even then she uttered no word. But when
darkness gathered she stole out into the grounds, and tried to end it
all then and there, and she would have succeeded but for his timely
happening upon the scene at the very moment that the flash-light had
shone so suddenly upon her.

Yes, the story concerning Jessie Bain had come like a thunder-bolt to
Gerelda Northrup. She had fallen on her face in the long green grass,
and was carried into the house