ck; for I knew if
you were harmed the fault was mine for having rather unceremoniously
deserted you."

This was more than Maggie could endure in silence. The frank
ingenuousness of her nature prevailed, and turning towards him her
dark, beautiful eyes, in which tears were shining, she said: "Forgive
me, Mr. Carrollton. I sent Gritty home on purpose to see if you would
be annoyed, for I felt vexed because you would not humor my whim and
meet me at the bridge. I am sorry I caused you any uneasiness," she
continued, as she saw a shadow flit over his face. "Will you forgive
me?"

Arthur Carrollton could not resist the pleading of those lustrous
eyes, nor yet refuse to take the ungloved hand she offered him;
and if, in token of reconciliation, he did press it a little more
fervently than Henry Warner would have thought at all necessary, he
only did what, under the circumstances, it was very natural he
should do. From the first Maggie Miller had been a puzzle to Arthur
Carrollton; but he was fast learning to read her--was beginning to
understand how perfectly artless she was--and this little incident
increased, rather than diminished, his admiration.

"I will forgive you, Maggie," he said, "on one condition. You must
promise never again to experiment with my feelings in a similar
manner."

The promise was readily given, and then they proceeded on as leisurely
as if at home there was no anxious grandmother vibrating between her
high-backed chair and the piazza, nor yet an Anna Jeffrey watching
them enviously as they came slowly up the road.

That night there came to Mr. Carrollton a letter from Montreal, saying
his immediate presence was necessary there, on a business matter of
some importance; and he accordingly decided to go on the morrow.

"When may we expect you back?" asked Madam Conway, as in the morning
he was preparing for his journey.

"It will, perhaps, be two months at least, before I return," said
he, adding that there was a possibility of his being obliged to go
immediately to England.

In the recess of the window Maggie was standing, thinking how lonely
the house would be without him, and wishing there was no such thing
as parting from those she liked--even as little as she did Arthur
Carrollton.

"I won't let him know that I care, though," she thought, and forcing a
smile to her face she was about turning to bid him good-by, when she
heard him tell her grandmother of the possibility there was that h