ied to break in, but she stopped him and kept the floor herself.

"I am not through yet. I am going to purge myself of the last vestiges
of artificiality and pretence, and then start fair on your own honest
level and be worthy mate to you thenceforth. My father honestly thinks
he is an earl. Well, leave him his dream, it pleases him and does no one
any harm: It was the dream of his ancestors before him. It has made
fools of the house of Sellers for generations, and it made something of a
fool of me, but took no deep root. I am done with it now, and for good.
Forty-eight hours ago I was privately proud of being the daughter of a
pinchbeck earl, and thought the proper mate for me must be a man of like
degree; but to-day--oh, how grateful I am for your love which has healed
my sick brain and restored my sanity!--I could make oath that no earl's
son in all the world--"

"Oh,--well, but--but--"

"Why, you look like a person in a panic. What is it? What is the
matter?"

"Matter? Oh, nothing--nothing. I was only going to say"--but in his
flurry nothing occurred to him to say, for a moment; then by a lucky
inspiration he thought of something entirely sufficient for the occasion,
and brought it out with eloquent force: "Oh, how beautiful you are! You
take my breath away when you look like that."

It was well conceived, well timed, and cordially delivered--and it got
its reward.

"Let me see. Where was I? Yes, my father's earldom is pure moonshine.
Look at those dreadful things on the wall. You have of course supposed
them to be portraits of his ancestors, earls of Rossmore. Well, they are
not. They are chromos of distinguished Americans--all moderns; but he
has carried them back a thousand years by re-labeling them. Andrew
Jackson there, is doing what he can to be the late American earl; and the
newest treasure in the collection is supposed to be the young English
heir--I mean the idiot with the crape; but in truth it's a shoemaker, and
not Lord Berkeley at all."

"Are you sure?"

"Why of course I am. He wouldn't look like that."

"Why?"

"Because his conduct in his last moments, when the fire was sweeping
around him shows that he was a man. It shows that he was a fine,
high-souled young creature."

Tracy was strongly moved by these compliments, and it seemed to him that
the girl's lovely lips took on anew loveliness when they were delivering
them. He said, softly:

"It is a pity he could not k