being promised a reward."

"A reward! Oh, Diane!"

"It's what you're offering me, isn't it? If it hadn't been for--for--the
great service you speak about, you wouldn't he here, asking me again to
be your wife."

"That's your way of putting it, but I'll put it in mine. If it hadn't
been for the magnitude of the sacrifice you're willing to make for me, I
shouldn't have dared to hope that you loved me. When all pretexts and
secondary causes have been considered and thrust aside, that's why I'm
here, and for no other reason whatever. If you love me," he continued,
"why should you hesitate any longer? If you love me, why seek for
reasons to justify the simple prompting of your heart? What have you and
I got to do with other people's opinions? When there's a plain,
straightforward course before us, why not go right on and follow it?"

She raised her eyes for one brief glance.

"You forget."

The words were spoken quietly, but they startled him.

"Yes, Diane; I do forget. Rather, there's nothing left for me to
remember. I know what you'd have me recall. I'll speak of it this once
more, to be silent on the subject forever. I want you to forgive me. I
want to tell you that I, too, have repented."

"Repented of what?"

"Of the wrong I've done you. I believe your soul to be as white as all
this whiteness around you."

"Then," she continued, questioning gently, "you've changed your point of
view during the last six months?"

"I have. You charged me then with being willing to come down to your
level; now I'm asking you to let me climb up to it. I see that I was a
self-righteous Pharisee, and that the true man is he who can smite his
breast and say, God be merciful to me a sinner!"

"A sinner--like me."

"I don't want to be led into further explanations," he said, suddenly on
his guard against her insinuations. "You and I have said too much to
each other not to be able to be frank. Now, I've been frank enough.
You've understood what I've felt at other times; you understand what I
feel to-day. Why draw me out, to make me speak more plainly?"

"I am not drawing you out," she declared. "If I ask you a question or
two, it was to show you that not even the woman that you take me
for--not even the forgiven penitent--could be a good wife for you. I
can't marry you, Mr. Pruyn. I must beg you to let that answer be
decisive."

There was decision in the way in which she folded her work and smoothed
the white brocaded surface