and had burst upon her with overwhelming
power when she heard that he was going home.

"He will never think of me again, I know," she said; "but, with my
present feelings, I cannot marry Henry, unless he insists upon it."

"Men seldom wish to marry a woman who says she does not love them, and
Henry Warner will not prove an exception," answered Madam Conway; and,
comforted with this assurance, Maggie folded up her letter, which was
soon on its way to Cuba.

The next evening, as Madam Conway sat alone with Mr. Carrollton, she
spoke of his return to England, expressing her sorrow, and asking why
he did not remain with them longer.

"I will deal frankly with you, madam," said he, "and say that if I
followed my own inclination I should stay, for Hillsdale holds for
me an attraction which no other spot possesses. I refer to your
granddaughter, who, in the little time I have known her, has grown
very dear to me--so dear that I dare not stay longer where she is,
lest I should love her too well, and rebel against yielding her to
another."

For a moment Madam Conway hesitated; but, thinking the case demanded
her speaking, she said: "Possibly Mr. Carrollton, I can make an
explanation which will show some points in a different light from that
in which you now see them. Margaret is engaged to Henry Warner, I will
admit; but the engagement has become irksome, and yesterday she wrote
asking a release, which he will grant, of course."

Instantly the expression of Mr. Carrollton's face was changed, and
very intently he listened while Madam Conway frankly told him the
story of Margaret's engagement up to the present time, withholding
from him nothing, not even Maggie's confession of the interest she
felt in him, an interest which had weakened her girlish attachment for
Henry Warner.

"You have made me very happy," Mr. Carrollton said to Madam Conway,
as, at a late hour, he bade her good-night--"happier than I can well
express; for without Margaret life to me would be dreary indeed."

The next morning, at the breakfast table, Anna Jeffrey, who was
in high spirits with the prospect of having Mr. Carrollton for a
fellow-traveler, spoke of their intended voyage, saying she could
hardly wait for the time to come, and asking if he were not equally
impatient to leave so horrid a country as America.

"On the contrary," he replied, "I should be sorry to leave America
just yet. I have therefore decided to remain a little longer;" and hi