e,
and she now the wife of another man? What of her promise? What must he
think of her?

"I didn't know it until after we were engaged," pursued Jack; "six
months. It was the day I questioned you about whether you would keep
your promise to Dick if he returned. I wanted to tell you then, but
the telling meant that I should lose you. He wrote to me from Mexico,
where he had been in the hospital. He was coming home--he enclosed
this letter to you."

Jack drew from his pocket the letter which Dick enclosed in the one
which he had sent Jack, telling of his proposed return.

She took the missive mechanically, and opened it slowly.

"I wanted to be square with him--but I loved you," pleaded Jack. "I
loved you better than life, than honor--I couldn't lose you, and so--"

His words fell on unheeding ears. She was not listening to his
pleadings. Her thoughts dwelt on Dick Lane, and what he must think of
her. She had taken refuge at the piano, on which she bowed her head
within her arms.

Slowly she arose, crushing the letter in her hand. In a low, stunned
voice she cried: "You lied to me."

Jack buried his face in his hands. "Yes," he confessed. "He came the
night we were married. I met him in the garden. He paid that money he
had borrowed from me when he went away."

Horror-struck, Echo turned to him. "He was there that night?" she
gasped. "Oh, Jack. You knew, and you never told me. I had given my
word to marry him--you, knowing that, have done this thing to me?" Her
deep emotion showed itself in her voice. The more Jack told her the
worse became her plight.

"I loved you." Jack was defending himself now, fighting for his love.

"Did Dick believe I knew he was living?" continued the girl mercilessly.

"He must have done so."

"Jack! Jack!" sobbed Echo, tears streaming down her face.

"What could I do? I was almost mad with fear of losing you. I was
tempted to kill him then and there. I left your father to guard the
door--to keep him out until after the ceremony."

Jack could scarcely control his voice. The sight of Echo's suffering
unmanned him.

"My father, too," wailed Echo.

"He thought only of your happiness," Jack claimed.

"What of my promise--my promise to marry Dick? Where is he?" moaned
the girl.

"He's gone back to the desert."

Over her swept the memory of the terrible dream. Dick dying of thirst
in the desert, calling for her; crushed to the earth by Jack after
battli