hour of saying it, as a man may well be when all his future life depends
upon the issue of a few words. I think you must know what I mean, Miss
Nowell. Marian, I think you can guess what is coming. I told you last
night how sweet Lidford had been to me."

"Yes," she said, with a bright inquiring look in her eyes. "But what have
I to do with that?"

"Everything. It is you who have made the little country village my
paradise. O Marian, tell me that it has not been a fool's paradise! My
darling, I love you with all my heart and soul, with an honest man's
first and only love. Promise that you will be my wife."

He took the hand that lay loosely on her lap, and pressed it in both his
own. She withdrew it gently, and sat looking at him with a face that had
grown suddenly pale.

"You do not know what you are asking," she said; "you cannot know.
Captain Sedgewick is not my uncle. He does not even know who my parents
were. I am the most obscure creature in the world."

"Not one degree less dear to me because of that, Marian; only the dearer.
Tell me, my darling, is there any hope for me?"

"I never thought----" she faltered; "I had no idea----"

"That to know you was to love you. My life and soul, I have loved you
from the hour I first saw you in Lidford church. I was a doomed man from
that moment, Marian. O my dearest, trust me, and it shall go hard if I do
not make your future life a happy one. Granted that I am ten years--more