His face said as much in the better language which needs no words.

"Then what's depressing you?" asked Moya brightly.

"I dread the life for you."

"But why?"

"I've been so utterly bored by it myself."

Her hand slid into his.

"Then you never will be again," she whispered, with a touching
confidence.

"No, not on my own account; of course not," said Rigden. "If only----"

And he sighed.

"If only what?"

For he had stopped short.

"If only you don't think better of all this--and of me!"

The girl withdrew her hand, and for a moment regarded Rigden critically,
as he leant forward in his chair and she leant back in hers. She did not
care for apologetic love-making, and she had met with more kinds than
one in her day. Rigden had not apologised when he proposed to her the
very week they met (last Cup-week), and, what was more to his credit,
had refused to apologise to her rather formidable family for so doing.
Whereupon they were engaged, and all her world wondered. No more
Government House--no more parties and picnics--but "one long picnic
instead," as her brother Theodore had once remarked before Moya, with
that brutal frankness which lent a certain piquancy to the family life
of the Bethunes. And the mere thought of her brother accounted for so
much in her mind, that Moya was leaning forward again in a moment, and
her firm little hand was back in its place.

"I believe it's Theodore!" she cried suspiciously.

"I--I don't understand," he said, telling the untruth badly.

"You do! He's been saying something. But you mustn't mind what Theodore
says; he's not to be taken seriously. Oh, how I wish I could have come
up alone!" cried Moya, with fine inconsistency, in the same breath. "But
next time," she whispered, "I will!"

"Not quite alone," he answered. And his tone was satisfactory at last.
And the least little wisp of a cloud between them seemed dispersed and
melted for ever and a day.

For Moya was quite in love for the first time in her life, though more
than once before she had been within measurable distance of that
enviable state. This enabled her to appreciate her present peace of mind
by comparing it with former feelings of a less convincing character. And
at last there was no doubt about the matter. She had fallen a happy
victim to the law of contrasts. Society favourite and city belle,
satiated with the attractions of the town, and deadly sick of the same
sort of young man, she had struck