cide my destiny.

* * * * *

Thrush Hill, May 6, 18--.

Well, it did decide it, but not exactly in the way I anticipated. I
can look back on the whole affair quite calmly now, but I wouldn't
live it over again for all the wealth of Ind.

That day when Gus Sinclair came I was all ready for him. I had put on
my very prettiest new gown to do honour to the occasion, and Alicia
smilingly assured me I was looking very well.

"And _so_ cool and composed. Will you be able to keep that up? Don't
you really feel a little nervous, Katherine?"

"Not in the least," I said. "I suppose I ought to be, according to
traditions, but I never felt less flustered in my life."

When Bessie brought up Gus Sinclair's card Alicia dropped a pecky
little kiss on my cheek, and pushed me toward the door. I went down
calmly, although I'll admit that my heart _was_ beating wildly. Gus
Sinclair was plainly nervous, but I was composed enough for both. You
would really have thought that I was in the habit of being proposed to
by a millionaire every day.

"I suppose you know what I have come to say," he said, standing before
me, as I leaned gracefully back in a big chair, having taken care that
the folds of my dress fell just as they should.

And then he proceeded to say it in a rather jumbled-up fashion, but
very sincerely.

I remember thinking at the time that he must have composed the speech
in his head the night before, and rehearsed it several times, but was
forgetting it in spots.

When he ended with the self-same question that Jack had asked me three
months before at Thrush Hill he stopped and took my hands.

I looked up at him. His good, homely face was close to mine, and in
his eyes was an unmistakable look of love and tenderness.

I opened my mouth to say yes.

And then there came over me in one rush the most awful realization of
the sacrilege I was going to commit.

I forgot everything except that I loved Jack Willoughby, and that I
could never, never marry anybody in the world except him.

Then I pulled my hands away and burst into hysterical, undignified
tears.

"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Sinclair. "I did not mean to startle
you. Have I been too abrupt? Surely you must have known--you must have
expected--"

"Yes--yes--I knew," I cried miserably, "and I intended right up to
this very minute to marry you. I'm so sorry--but I can't--I can't."

"I don't