the life of me make out what you mean by that.'

'Oh! A soul that has come back and back, and has lived a great
many--perhaps naughty--lives.'

'H'm! Yes! Well, one life is good enough for me, and as we can't prove
the other thing, what does it matter anyhow? I wouldn't want you in
another life if you were going to be quite a different person. I want
you as you are in this one. And so I reckon would any man who has ever
been in love with you. Let us go back now to what I was asking you.
Biddy, there WAS a man--one man that you did care for? You've admitted
as much.'

'Yes--I suppose there was.'

'And not so long before you came out here?'

'I suppose that's true too.'

'Bridget!--do you know what's been festering in my mind--the thought
that you might be marrying me in a fit of pique--a sort of reaction.
Biddy--tell me honestly, my dear, if it's anything of that sort?'

She seemed to be considering.

'I don't quite know how to answer you, Colin--if I'm to be absolutely
honest. And I'd always rather tell you the truth.'

'Thank God for that. Let there be truth between us--truth at any cost.'

'You see,' she said slowly. 'My whole coming out here--everything I've
done lately, has been done in reaction against all I've done and felt
before.'

'Would you have married that man--if everything had been on the square?'

'What do you mean by "on the square"? I've done nothing to be properly
ashamed of!'

'No--no--I was thinking only of him, Biddy, did you love that
man?--really love him?'

'I'm not sure yet whether I'm capable of what you'd call loving really.
I had a violent attraction to him,'--he remembered the phrase--'I
confess I did feel it dreadfully when he married someone else. Now it
doesn't hurt me. And of course, he has gone out of my life altogether.
I'm glad he has, and I hope he will keep on the other side of the
world.'

'Well, let it stop at that.' He drew a breath of relief. 'I don't
believe you really cared for him. If you had, you couldn't take it as
you do. I'll never bother you again about that man. And, oh, my
dear--my dear--it doesn't seem to me possible that you shouldn't come
to love me, when I love you as I do--with my whole heart and soul--I
worship you, Biddy. And I'll not say again that I'm unworthy of you--a
man who loves a woman like that CAN'T be unworthy.'

He took her in his arms and kissed her. And this time she did not
resist the caress.

They were married with muc