my thoughts slackened,--I took up my embroidery and began to work at
it again.

"That is so, isn't it?" persisted Miss Harland--"Though you blush
and grow pale as if there was someone in the background."

I met her inquisitive glance and smiled.

"There is no one,"--I said--"There never has been anyone." I paused;
I could almost feel the warmth of the strong hand that had held mine
in my dream of the past night. It was mere fancy, and I went on--"I
should not care for what modern men and women call love. It seems
very unsatisfactory."

She sighed.

"It is frequently very selfish,"--she said--"I want to tell you my
love-story--may I?"

"Why, of course!" I answered, a little wonderingly, for I had not
thought she had a love-story to tell.

"It's very brief,"--she said, and her lip quivered--"There was a man
who used to visit our house very often when I first came out,--he
made me believe he was very fond of me. I was more than fond of him-
-I almost worshipped him. He was all the world to me, and though
father did not like him very much he wished me to be happy, so we
were engaged. That was the time of my life--the only time I ever
knew what happiness was. One evening, just about three months before
we were to be married, we were together at a party in the house of