as this--and others--are
merely heartless.

Lord Saint Sinnes leads the way deliberately to the most secluded
part of the garden. There are two chairs at the end of a narrow
pathway. Mabel sits down hopelessly. She is a quiet-eyed little girl,
with brown hair and gentle ways. Just--in a word--the sort of girl
who usually engages the affections of blushing, open-air, horsey men.
She has no spirit, and those who know her mother are not surprised.
She is going to say yes, because she dare not say no. At least two
lives are going to be wrecked at the end of the narrow path.

Lord Saint Sinnes sits down at her side and contemplates his pointed
toes. Then he looks at her--his clean-shaven face very grave--with
the eye of the steeplechase rider.

"Miss Maddison"--jerk of the chin and pull at collar--"you're in a
ghastly fright."

Miss Maddison draws in a sudden breath, like a sob, and looks at her
lacework handkerchief.

"You think I'm going to ask you to marry me?"

Still no answer. The stiff collar gleams in the light of a Chinese
lantern. Lord Saint Sinnes's linen is a matter of proverb.

"But I'm not. I'm not such a cad as that."

The girl raises her head, as if she hears a far-off sound.

"I know that old worn----. I daresay I would give great satisfaction
to some people if I did! But ... I can't help that."

Mabel is bending forward, hiding her face. A tear falls on her silk
dress with a little dull flop. Young Saint Sinnes looks at
her--almost as if he were going to take her in his arms. Then he
shuts his upper teeth over his lower lip, hard--just as he does when
riding at the water jump.

"A fellow mayn't be much to look at," he says, gruffly, "but he can
ride straight, for all that."

Mabel half turns her head, and he has the satisfaction of concluding
that she has no fault to find with his riding.

"Of course," he says, abruptly, "there is s'm' other fellow?"

After a pause, Miss Maddison nods.

"Miss Maddison," says Lord Saint Sinnes, rising and jerking his knees
back after the manner of horsey persons, "you can go back into that
room and take your Bible oath that I never asked you to marry me."

Mabel rises also. She wants to say something, but there is a lump in
her throat.

"Some people," he goes on, "will say that you bungled it, others that
I behaved abominably, but--but we know better, eh?"

He offers his arm, and they walk toward the house.

Suddenly he stops, and fidgets in his colla