as before,
and, unless May was prepared to share them, they would gradually drift
apart. He must put it all before her to-morrow, lest she should make a
lifelong mistake.

But May had made no mistake; she knew her own mind, at last, for
absence from Paul had taught it her. She had turned with absolute
loathing from the mill-round of gaiety which was the only marked
characteristic of her life in London; and her thoughts had recurred
persistently to Rudham, until finally, in the time of distress, she had
followed the dictates of her heart and gone down there. But not until
the day of Kitty's funeral, when she stood beside Paul at her grave,
had she owned to herself that he was the man she loved: a conviction
which deepened into certainty in the weeks which followed, for,
although she saw little of him, to be in the place where he lived, and
in some way to share his work, made her happy, and gave her a sense of
repose which had not been hers since she left.

Mrs. Webster shed some very bitter tears when, after dinner that
evening, May announced her engagement.

"It is wicked of him to have asked you! he is as poor as a church
mouse!"

"I can't remember, exactly, but I don't think he did ask me," said May,
knitting her pretty brows. "He did once before, but I don't think he
did to-day. But he was so very miserable that----"

"Well!" interposed Mrs. Webster, "in my young days girls left it to the
men to speak."

"Oh, mother, don't scold! I am so happy--happier that I have ever been
before. You know you have wished me to marry; let me marry the man I
love."

"It is such an ill-assorted match; he has no money----"

"And I have plenty," said May.

"And how can I ever consent to your living in a cottage?" went on Mrs.
Webster, with a wail of despair.

"Oh, we have not come to that yet!" May answered, unable to check a
laugh; "but I dare say he will not wish it. We could live quite simply
at the Court. I wonder if we shall run to a house-parlourmaid?"

"It's no laughing matter; you have been used to every luxury, May."

"I have had more than my share. I feel rather a surfeit of the
sweetest things."

"And he does not go to church----"

"But he is more in earnest than many of the men who do," said May. "Of
this I am sure, that he is seeking after God; if I were not sure, I do
not believe I should have the courage to marry him. A year back I
should not have cared what a man thought as long as he led