e passed the first
thatched cottages of a village.

I ought to feel inexpressibly relieved. For now all my fears regarding
the Honourable Jim are at rest for evermore. He won't marry her for her
fortune, for the simple reason that she won't have him! And she won't
break her heart and make herself wretched over this perfidy of his,
because a perfidious man ceases to have any attraction for her honest
heart. That sort of girl doesn't, "while she hates the sin, love the
poor sinner."

What a merciful dispensation!

It's too utterly ridiculous to feel annoyed with Million for turning her
coat like this. It's inconsistent. I mustn't be inconsistent. I must
trample down this feeling of being a little sorry for the blue-eyed
pirate who has been forced to strike his flag and to flee before the
gale of Miss Nellie Million's wrath.

I ought, if anything, to be still feeling angry with Mr. James Burke on
my own account: teasing me about ... pairs of gloves and all that
nonsense!

Anyhow, there's one danger removed from the path. And now I think I see
clearly enough what must come. Miss Million, having found that she's
been deceived in smooth talk and charming flattery and Celtic
love-making, will turn to the sincerity of that bomb-dropping American
cousin of hers.

They'll marry--oh, yes; they'll marry without another hitch in the
course of the affair. And I----Yes, of course, I shall marry, too. I
shall marry that other honest and sincere young man--the English
one--Mr. Reginald Brace.

But I must see Million--Miss Million--married first. I must dress her
for her wedding. I must arrange the veil over her glossy little dark
head; I must order her bouquet of white heather and lilies; I must be
her bridesmaid, or one of them, even if she does have a dozen other
girls from the "Refuge" as well!

And who'll give her away? Mr. Chesterton, the old lawyer, will, I
suppose, take the part of the bride's father.

Miss Vi Vassity is sure to make some joke about being the
bride's mother. She is sure to be the life and soul of that
wedding-party--wherever it is. It's sure to be a delightfully
gay affair, the wedding of Nellie Million to her cousin, Hiram
P. Jessop! I'm looking forward to it most awfully----

These were the thoughts with which I was harmlessly and unsuspectingly
amusing myself as Miss Million and I walked along down the white Sussex
highroad in the golden evening light.

And in the middle of this maiden meditati