other man, the love, or what I thought was love, I knew in the few
brief weeks of my early betrothal. But you must know how that ended,
and I have no desire to repeat the mad experiment of risking my
earthly all upon one throw of fate. If friendship--if esteem, and
the resolve to show myself a worthy recipient of your generous
confidence--will content you, all else shall be as you wish."

In her determination to be candid, to leave him in no uncertainty as
to her actual sentiments, she had concerted a response but a degree
less stilted than his proposal. She would have been ashamed of it
had he appeared less gratified.

His dull eyes brightened; his face flushed and beamed with unfeigned
delight, and in his transport he said the most natural and graceful
thing that ever escaped him during his wooing.

"I am content! The second love of Mabel Aylett must ever be more to
me than the first of any other woman!"

True, he nearly spoiled all the next minute, by producing from his
pocket a wee velvet case, from which he extracted a valuable diamond
ring, and proceeded, then and there, in the shadow of the
accommodating curtain, to fit it upon her finger. He had foreseen
that she would not be hardly won, and with characteristic providence
had prepared himself for the event.

The blood leaped to Mabel's temples and the fire to her eye, at the
prompt seal set by the practical non-enthusiast upon the contract,
but she bit her lip, and submitted after a second of thought. He
owed his exemption from rebuke to her memory of his latest