't see how any man could; but I don't mean to ask you to
marry me as long as I can keep out of it."

She continued to smile. "I like your frankness; but I am afraid our
friendship can hardly continue on those terms." She turned away, as
though to mark that its final term had in fact been reached, and he
followed her for a few steps with a baffled sense of her having after all
kept the game in her own hands.

"Miss Lily----" he began impulsively; but she walked on without seeming
to hear him.

He overtook her in a few quick strides, and laid an entreating hand on
her arm. "Miss Lily--don't hurry away like that. You're beastly hard on a
fellow; but if you don't mind speaking the truth I don't see why you
shouldn't allow me to do the same."

She had paused a moment with raised brows, drawing away instinctively
from his touch, though she made no effort to evade his words.

"I was under the impression," she rejoined, "that you had done so without
waiting for my permission."

"Well--why shouldn't you hear my reasons for doing it, then? We're
neither of us such new hands that a little plain speaking is going to
hurt us. I'm all broken up on you: there's nothing new in that. I'm more
in love with you than I was this time last year; but I've got to face the
fact that the situation is changed."

She continued to confront him with the same air of ironic composure.
"You mean to say that I'm not as desirable a match as you thought me?"

"Yes; that's what I do mean," he answered resolutely. "I won't go into
what's happened. I don't believe the stories about you--I don't WANT to
believe them. But they're there, and my not believing them ain't going to
alter the situation."

She flushed to her temples, but the extremity of her need checked the
retort on her lip and she continued to face him composedly. "If they are
not true," she said, "doesn't THAT alter the situation?"

He met this with a steady gaze of his small stock-taking eyes, which made
her feel herself no more than some superfine human merchandise. "I
believe it does in novels; but I'm certain it don't in real life. You
know that as well as I do: if we're speaking the truth, let's speak the
whole truth. Last year I was wild to marry you, and you wouldn't look at
me: this year--well, you appear to be willing. Now, what has changed in
the interval? Your situation, that's all. Then you thought you could do
better; now----"

"You think you can?" broke from her iron