been turned down--hard. I can tell by the back of his neck."

This struck Beatrice, and she began to study the retreating neck of
her suitor. "I can't see any difference," she announced, after a brief
scrutiny.

"It's rather sunburned and thick."

"I'll gamble his mind is a jumble of good English oaths--with maybe a
sprinkling of Boer maledictions. What did you do?"

"Nothing--unless, perhaps, he objects to being disciplined a bit. But I
also object to being badgered into matrimony--even with Sir Redmond."

"Even with Sir Redmond!" Dick whistled. "He's 'It,' then, is he?"

Beatrice had nothing to say. She walked beside Dick and looked at the
ground before her.

"He doesn't seem a bad sort, sis, and the title will be nice to have
in the family, if one cares for such things. Mother does. She was
disappointed, I take it, that Wiltmar was a younger son."

"Yes, she was. She used to think that Sir Redmond might get killed down
there fighting the Boers, and then Wiltmar would be next in line. But he
didn't, and it was Wiltmar who went first. And now oh, it's humiliating,
Dick! To be thrown at a man's head--" Tears were not far from her voice
just then.

"I can see she wants you to nab the title. Well, sis, if you don't care
for the man--"

"I never said I didn't care for him. But I just can't treat him
decently, with mama dinning that title in my ears day and night. I wish
there wasn't any title. Oh, it's abominable! Things have come to that
point where an American girl with money is not supposed to care for
an Englishman, no matter how nice he may be, if he has a title, or the
prospect of one. Every one laughs and thinks it's the title she wants;
they'd think it of me, and they'd say it. They would say Beatrice
Lansell took her half-million and bought her a lord. And, after a while,
perhaps Sir Redmond himself would half-believe it--and I couldn't bear
that! And so I am--unbearably flippant and--I should think he'd hate
me!"

"So you reversed the natural order of things, and refused him on account
of the title?" Dick grinned surreptitiously.

"No, I didn't--not quite. I'm afraid he's dreadfully angry with me,
though. I do wish he wasn't such a dear."

"You're the same old Trix. You've got to be held back from the trail
you're supposed to take, or you won't travel it; you'll bolt the other
way. If everybody got together and fought the notion, you would probably
elope with milord inside a week. Mother means wel