you proposed in the grotto--was--was--not I,"
she faltered, grasping the door-knob for support, and gazing into the
mirror with a vain hope to hide her blushes.

He drew a long sigh of relief. That intelligence simplified existence
enormously. He had had a hopeless feeling, of late, that life was too
complex an affair for him to grapple with. Now, as by a flash, order
was restored in his chaotic universe. He stood gazing in rapture at
Miss Jones's blushing face, which seemed angelic in its purity and its
dignified maidenhood. That there dwelt a sweet young soul behind
those blameless features he felt blissfully convinced.

"Miss Jones," he began, "if Miss Roeschen has confessed to you, you
know what I would have liked to say to you--that night in the grotto.
Now, what would you have answered me?"

A little ray of mirth stole over the girl's face, and vanished again.

"I should have said--no," she remarked smilingly.

The orderly universe again tumbled into chaos. She was the veritable
Sphinx, and he not the Oedipus to read her riddle.

"Then I will bid you good-bye," he managed to stammer, extending an
unwilling hand and again withdrawing it.

"Good-bye, Mr. Grover," she said with heartless cheerfulness; "I hope
it is not forever."

"I am afraid it is," he murmured sadly.

He took two steps toward the door, and laid his hand on the knob.

"Oh, by the way," ejaculated the girl, with a sudden alarm in her
voice; "that question you would have asked me in the grotto--why don't
you ask it now?"

"You said you would say no."

He had turned about in unutterable astonishment.

"I didn't say that," she retorted gravely.

"What did you say then?"

"That I should have said No _in the grotto_."

The scene which followed was of a strictly private and confidential
character; I fear Miss Jones would take me to task if I divulged it.

THE STORY OF TWO LIVES.

BY JULIA SCHAYER.

_Swinton's Story-Teller, October 31, 1883._

The early darkness of a moonless winter night had fallen, nowhere more
darkly and coldly than upon a certain small western town, whose houses
were huddled together in the valley as if for mutual protection
against the fierce winds sweeping through the trackless forests which
surrounded it. Here and there the cheerful glow of lamp or fire shone
from some uncurtained window, most brightly from the windows of the
stores and saloons that occupied the centre of the town, whence issued
also