the resulting combine."

"If you wouldn't play bridge with Mrs. Harley?"

"Exactly."

"And you?"

"Declined to pledge myself."

She clapped her hands softly. "Well done, Waring Ridgway! There are
times when you are magnificent, when I could put you on a pedestal, you
great big, unafraid man. But you mustn't play with her, just the same."

"Why mustn't I?"

"For her sake."

He frowned past her into space, his tight-shut jaw standing out
saliently. "You're right, Virginia. I've been thinking so myself. I'll
keep off the grass," he said, at last.

"You're a good fellow," slipped out impulsively.

"Well, I know where there's another," he said. "I ought to think myself
a lucky dog."

Virginia lifted quizzical eyebrows. "Ought to! That tastes of duty.
Don't let it come to that. We'll take it off if you like." She touched
the solitaire he had given her.

"Ah, but I don't like"--he smiled.

CHAPTER 12. ALINE MAKES A DISCOVERY

Aline pulled her horse to a walk. "You know Mr. Ridgway pretty well,
don't you?"

Miss Balfour gently flicked her divided skirt with a riding-whip,
considering whether she might be said to know him well. "Yes, I think I
do," she ventured.

"Mrs. Mott says you and he are great friends, that you seem very fond
of each other."

"Goodness me! I hope I don't seem fond of him. I don't think 'fond' is
exactly the word, anyway, though we are good friends." Quickly, keenly,
her covert glance swept Aline; then, withdrawing her eyes, she flung
her little bomb. "I suppose we may be said to appreciate each other. At
any rate, we are engaged."

Mrs. Harley's pony came to an abrupt halt. "I thought I had dropped my
whip," she explained, in a low voice not quite true.

Virginia, though she executed an elaborate survey of the scenery, could
not help noticing that the color had washed from her friend's face. "I
love this Western country--its big sweep of plains, of low, rolling
hills, with a background of mountains. One can see how it gets into a
man's blood so that the East seems insipid ever afterward," discoursed
Miss Balfour.

A question trembled on Aline's blanched lips.

"Say it," permitted Virginia.

"Do you mean that you are engaged to him--that you are going to marry
Mr. Ridgway--without caring for him?"

"I don't mean that at all. I like him immensely."

"But--do you love him?" It was almost a cry--these low words wrung from
the tortured heart.

"No fair," warned her frien