d it to a vision of her face: the haunting eyes
which, at first sight, had destroyed his peace of mind; the dead black
hair against the ivory-coloured skin. It was in these things that the
truth lay, not in the blind promptings of her inclination.

For the first time, the idea of marriage took definite shape in his
mind. For all he knew, it might have been lying dormant there, all
along; but he would doubtless have remained unconscious of it, for
weeks to come, had it not been for the events of the afternoon. Now,
however, Louise had made it plain that his feelings for her were of an
exaggerated delicacy; plain that she herself had no such scruples. He
need hesitate no longer. But marry! ... marriage! ... he marry
Louise!--at the thought of it, he laughed. That he, Maurice Guest,
should, for an instant, put himself on a par with her American suitor!
The latter, rich, leisured, able to satisfy her caprices, surround her
with luxury: himself, younger than she by several years, without
prospects, with nothing to offer her but a limitless devotion. He tried
to imagine himself saying: "Louise, will you marry me?" and the words
stuck in his throat; for he saw the amused astonishment of her eyes.
And not merely at the presumption he would be guilty of; what was as
clear to him as day was that she did not really care for him; not as he
cared for her; not with the faintest hint of a warmer feeling. If he
had never grasped this before, he did so now, to the full. Sitting
there, he affirmed to himself that she did not even like him. She was
grateful to him, of course, for his help and friendship; but that was
all. Beyond this, he would not have been surprised to learn from her
own lips that she actually disliked him: for there was something
irreconcilable about their two natures. And never, for a moment, had
she considered him in the light of an eligible lover--oh, how that
stung! Here was she, with an attraction for him which nothing could
weaken; and in him was not the smallest lineament, of body or of mind,
to wake a response in her. He was powerless to increase her happiness
by a hair's breadth. Her nerves would never answer to the inflection of
his voice, or the touch of his hand. How could such things be? What
anomaly was here?

To-day, her face rose before him unsought--the sweet, dark face with
the expression of slight melancholy that it wore in repose, as he loved
it best. It was with him when, stiff and tired, he emerge