interpret them after your own fashion?" I asked, sternly.

"Oh, of course he said nothing of the kind; I would not have permitted
it, had he wished to. Poor fellow! I hope you will be kinder to him than
I have been," and she sighed heavily. "He is yours now to have and to
hold, you know."

"You have not shown your usual good taste, Evelyn," I remarked, coolly,
"in rejecting so handsome and fascinating a man, and making him over to
another, unsolicited. Claude Bainrothe would suit you exactly, I think;
and, as to money, he will have enough, no doubt, for both. If not"--I
hesitated--colored--sighed.

"If not, what, Miriam?" she urged, stamping her little foot impatiently
as my answer was delayed. "If not, what then, Miriam? Speak out!"

"If not, dear sister, _I_ will try to make up the _deficiency_," I said,
embracing her. "Now you understand my intentions."

I was learning to love my sister, and happy in the power to please her,
unconscious that an invisible barrier was rising from that hour, never
to be put aside.




CHAPTER IV.


For a discarded lover heartlessly played with, as she herself confessed