elieve a word you say; but you are the dearest,
truest, honestest girl in the world, and I love you all the better for
being so modest about yourself. For me, I'm just a plain, sober sort of
fellow. I never was bright like the others, and there's nothing in the
least 'subtle' or hard to understand about me; but I don't believe I
shall make the worse husband for that. It's only in French novels that
dark, inscrutable characters are good for daily use."

"Indeed, I don't want an inscrutable husband. I like you much better as
you are." Then, after a happy pause, "Isabel Templestowe--she's Geoff's
sister, you know, and my most intimate friend at home--predicted that I
should marry over here, but I never supposed I should. It didn't seem
likely that any one would want me, for I'm not pretty or interesting,
like your sisters, you know."

"Oh, I say!" cried Dorry, "haven't I been telling you that you interest
me more than any one in the world ever did before? I never saw a girl
whom I considered could hold a candle to you,--certainly not one of my
own sisters. You don't think your people at home will make any
objections, do you?"

"No, indeed; they'll be very pleased to have me settled, I should think.
There are a good many of us at home, you know."

Meanwhile, a little farther up the same canyon, but screened from
observation by a projecting shoulder of rock, another equally
satisfactory conversation was going on between another pair of lovers.
Johnnie and Lionel had strolled up there about an hour before Dorry and
Imogen arrived. They had no idea that any one else was in the ravine.

"I think I knew two years ago that I cared more for you than any one
else," Lionel was saying.

"Did you? Perhaps the faintest suspicion of such a thing occurred to me
too."

"I used to keep thinking about you at odd minutes all day, when I was
working over the cattle and everything, and I always thought steadily
about you at night when I was falling asleep."

"Very strange, certainly."

"And the moment you came and I saw you again, it flashed upon me what it
meant; and I perceived that I had been desperately in love with you all
along without knowing it."

"Still stranger."

"Don't tease me, darling Johnnie,--no, Joan; I like that better than
Johnnie. It makes me think of Joan d'Arc. I shall call you that, may I?"

"How can I help it? You have a big will of your own, as I always knew.
Only don't connect me with the ark unless you