Lynde," she replied, sitting erect in the saddle, with the brightness
and the blackness deepening in her eyes. "I wonder if I can make you
understand how I prize it. My life has not been quite like that of other
girls, partly because I have lived much abroad, and partly because I
have been very delicate ever since my childhood; I had a serious lung
trouble then, which has never left me. You would not think it, to look
at me. Perhaps it is the anxiety I have given aunt Gertrude which has
made her so tenacious of my affection that I have scarcely been
permitted to form even those intimacies which girls form among
themselves. I have never known any one--any gentleman--as intimately as
I have known you. She has let me have you for my friend."

"But Miss Ruth"--

"Mr. Lynde," she said, interrupting him, "it was solely to your
friendship that my aunt confided me to-day. I should be deceiving her if
I allowed you to speak as--as you were speaking."

Lynde saw his mistake. He should have addressed himself in the first
instance to the aunt. He had been lacking in proper regard for the
convenances, forgetting that Ruth's education had been different from
that of American girls. At home, if you love a girl you tell her so;
over here, you go and tell her grandmother. Lynde dropped his head and
remained silent, resolving to secure an interview with Mrs. Denham that
night if possible. After a moment or two he raised his face. "Miss
Ruth," said he, "if I had to choose, I would rather be your friend than
any other woman's lover."

"That is settled, then," she returned, with heightened color. "We will
not refer to this again;" and she brushed away a butterfly that was