me race meeting was going on."

"Do you really take me for such as that, Emily?"

"Yes, I do. That is what they tell me you are. Is it not true? Don't
you go to races?"

"I should be quite willing to undertake never to put my foot on a
racecourse again this minute. I will do so now if you will only ask
it of me."

She paused a moment, half thinking that she would ask it, but at last
she determined against it.

"No," she said; "if you think it proper to stay away, you can do so
without my asking it. I have no right to make such a request. If you
think races are bad, why don't you stay away of your own accord?"

"They are bad," he said.

"Then why do you go to them?"

"They are bad, and I do go to them. They are very bad, and I go
to them very often. But I will stay away and never put my foot on
another racecourse if you, my cousin, will ask me."

"That is nonsense."

"Try me. It shall not be nonsense. If you care enough about me to
wish to save me from what is evil, you can do it. I care enough about
you to give up the pursuit at your bidding."

As he said this he looked down into her eyes, and she knew that the
full weight of his gaze was upon her. She knew that his words and his
looks together were intended to impress her with some feeling of his
love for her. She knew at the moment, too, that they gratified her.
And she remembered also in the same moment that her Cousin George was
a black sheep.

"If you cannot refrain from what is bad without my asking you," she
said, "your refraining will do no good."

He was making her some answer, when she insisted on being taken away.
"I must get into the dancing-room; I must indeed, George. I have
already thrown over some poor wretch. No, not yet, I see, however. I
was not engaged for the quadrille; but I must go back and look after
the people."

He led her back through the crowd; and as he did so he perceived that
Sir Harry's eyes were fixed upon him. He did not much care for that.
If he could carry his Cousin Emily, he thought that he might carry
the Baronet also.

He could not get any special word with her again that night. He asked
her for another dance, but she would not grant it to him. "You forget
the princes and potentates to whom I have to attend," she said to
him, quoting his own words.

He did not blame her, even to himself, judging by the importance
which he attached to every word of private conversation which he
could have with her, that she f