nt out; then he sank back weak and stricken into his
chair, gazing as if he could never have his fill at her noble countenance
luminous with a boundless pity if not with the tenderness of an
unforgotten love.

When she was near enough to speak without effort and had thanked the
gentlemen who had made way for her with every evidence of respect, she
addressed him in quite a natural tone but with strange depths of feeling
in her voice:

"What is it you want to say to me? As I stood at the door, I heard you
tell these gentlemen that you would like to have a few minutes' talk with
me. I was glad to hear that; and I am ready to listen to--_anything_."

The pause she made before uttering the last word caused it to ring with
double force when it fell. All heads drooped at the sound and the lines
came out on Mr. Gryce's face till he looked his eighty-five years and
more. But what Carleton Roberts had to say at this critical moment of his
double life was not at all what they expected to hear.

Rising, for her eyes seemed to draw him to his feet, he cried in the
indescribable tone of suppressed feeling:

"Shadows are falling upon me. My interview with these gentlemen may end
in a way I cannot now foresee. In my uncertainty as to how and when we
may meet again, I should like to make you such amends as opportunity
allows me. Ermentrude, will you marry me--now--to-night, before leaving
this house?"

A low cry escaped her. She was no more prepared for this astounding offer
than were these others. "Carleton!" came in a groan from her lips.
"Carleton! Carleton!" the word rising in intensity as thought followed
thought and her spirits ran the full gamut of what this proposal on his
part meant in past, present and future. Then she fell silent and they saw
the great soul of the woman illumine a countenance always noble, with the
light of a purpose altogether lofty. When she spoke it was to say:

"I recognize your kindness and the impulse which led to this offer. But
I do not wish to add so much as a feather's weight to your difficulties.
Let matters remain as they are till after----"

He took a quick step toward her.

"Not if my heart is full of regret?" he cried. "Not if I recognize in
you now the one influence left in this world which can help me bear the
burden of my own past and the threatening collapse of my whole future?"

"No," she replied, with an access of emotion of so elevated a type it
added to rather than detracted