Leah Mordecai, the Jewess, as only a friend. Do you promise?" she
said, trembling from head to to foot, for it had required all the
moral strength of her yielding nature to utter these words-words
that could instantly quench the only taper of hope that still burned
in her soul.

"Do I promise?" he replied with haughty emotion. "No! I swear I will
not! So long as you are free I will love you; and so long as your
maidenhood gives the opportunity, I shall tell you of that love.
Give you up? I, who love you with a mad and foolish devotion? I
promise not to love you? No! no! Never, never, never, while hope
lasts. What care I if you are a Jewess? It's the shrine of beauty
where I bow, and because a Jewess breathes therein, shall I withdraw
my homage? Never while I live. I swear it!"

Frightened at her desperate lover's words, Leah walked on in
silence, almost regretting that her courage had permitted her to
speak her mind so freely. After a time she said, "Do not be angry
with me, Mr. Le Grande, I did not mean to offend you."

"It's worse than offence, it is death," he replied.

Ascending the steps of her uncle's house, by this time reached, Leah
extended her hand and said, "Good-by. I'll tarry here to-night."
Clasping her soft hand, he said, "I shall see you soon. Good-night."

A week after Madam Truxton's school closed, the term of the military
academy ended. The drilling, drilling, drilling, was stopped, the
graduating class of cadets had either won or lost the honors for
which they contested; and the roll of candidates for military honors