first kiss I have ever given to any man."

He stooped. She kissed him on the forehead, then upon the lips.

"Guida, my wife," Philip said, and drew her to his breast.

"My Philip," she answered softly. "Won't you say, 'Philip, my husband'?"

She shyly did as he asked in a voice no louder than a bee's. She was
only seventeen.

Presently she looked up at him with a look a little abashed, a little
anxious, yet tender withal.

"Philip," she said, "I wonder what we will think of this day a year from
now--no, don't frown, Philip," she added. "You look at things so
differently from me. To-day is everything to you; to-morrow is very much
to me. It isn't that I am afraid, it is that thoughts of possibilities
will come whether or no. If I couldn't tell you everything I feel I
should be most unhappy. You see, I want to be able to do that, to tell
you everything."

"Of course, of course," he said, not quite comprehending her, for his
thoughts were always more material. He was revelling in the beauty of
the girl before him, in her perfect outward self, in her unique
personality. The more subtle, the deeper part of her, the searching soul
never to be content with superficial reasons and the obvious cause, these
he did not know--was he ever to know? It was the law of her nature that
she was never to deceive herself, to pretend anything, nor to forgive
pretence. To see things, to look beyond the Hedge, that was to be a