'It is more than enough,' said Mary. 'I have told you that I would
gladly share poverty with you.'

'Sweet! it is good of you to say as much, but I would not take you at
your word. You don't know what poverty is.'

'Do you think I am a coward, or self-indulgent? You are wrong, Jack. May
I call you Jack, as Maulevrier does?'

'May you?'

The question evoked such a gush of tenderness that he was fain to kneel
beside her chair and kiss the little hand holding the cup, before he
considered he had answered properly.

'You are wrong, Jack. I do know what poverty means. I have studied the
ways of the poor, tried to console them, and help them a little in their
troubles; and I know there is no pain that want of money can bring which
I would not share willingly with you. Do you suppose my happiness is
dependent on a fine house and powdered footmen? I should like to go to
the Red River with you, and wear cotton gowns, and tuck up my sleeves
and clean our cottage.'

'Very pretty sport, dear, for a summer day; but my Mary shall have a
sweeter life, and shall occasionally walk in silk attire.'

That tea-drinking by the fireside in the inn parlour was the most
delicious thing within John Hammond's experience. Mary was a bewitching
compound of earnestness and simplicity, so humble, so confiding, so