ll recover, as--hem! others
have done. A little headache--you call it heartache--and up you rise
again, looking better than ever. No doubt, to have a grain of sense
forced into your brains, you poor dear children! must be painful.. Girls
suffer as much as boys, I assure you. More, for their heads are weaker,
and their appetites less constant. Do I talk like your father now?
Whatever makes the boy fidget at his watch so?"

Richard stopped short. Time spoke urgently.

"I must go," he said.

His face did not seem good for trifling. Mrs. Doria would trifle in
spite.

"Listen, Clare! Richard is going. He says he has an engagement. What
possible engagement can a young man have at eleven o'clock in the
morning?--unless it's to be married!" Mrs. Doria laughed at the
ingenuity of her suggestion.

"Is the church handy, Ricky?" said Adrian. "You can still give us
half-an-hour if it is. The celibate hours strike at Twelve." And he also
laughed in his fashion.

"Won't you stay with us, Richard?" Clare asked. She blushed timidly, and
her voice shook.

Something indefinite--a sharp-edged thrill in the tones made the burning
bridegroom speak gently to her.

"Indeed, I would, Clare; I should like to please you, but I have a most
imperative appointment--that is, I promised--I must go. I shall see you
again"--

Mrs. Doria, took forcible possession of him. "Now, do come, and don't
waste words. I insist upon your having some breakfast first, and then,
if you really must go, you shall. Look! there's the house. At least you
will accompany your aunt to the door."

Richard conceded this. She little imagined what she required of him. Two
of his golden minutes melted into nothingness. They were growing to be
jewels of price, one by one more and more precious as they ran, and now
so costly-rare--rich as his blood! not to kindest relations, dearest
friends, could he give another. The die is cast! Ferryman! push off.

"Good-bye!" he cried, nodding bluffly at the three as one, and fled.

They watched his abrupt muscular stride through the grounds of the
house. He looked like resolution on the march. Mrs. Doria, as usual with
her out of her brother's hearing, began rating the System.

"See what becomes of that nonsensical education! The boy really does not
know how to behave like a common mortal. He has some paltry appointment,
or is mad after some ridiculous idea of his own, and everything must
be sacrificed to it! That's what Austin