Something's gone."

"But if something else has taken its place----"

"Nothing can----"

"Something greater----"

"I don't care for the sample you showed me," she returned quietly.

"I was crazy, Beth. I lost my head. It won't happen again."

"No. I know it won't----"

"You don't understand. It couldn't. I've made a fool of myself. Isn't it
enough for me to admit that?"

"I knew it all the time." She was cruel, and from her cruelty he guessed
the measure of her pride.

"I've done all I can to atone. I want you to know that I love you. I do,
Beth. I love you----"

There was a note in his voice different from that she had heard the
other day. His head was bent and he did not hear the little gasp or see
the startled look in her eyes, which she controlled before he raised his
head. With great deliberateness she answered him.

"Maybe you and I--have a different idea of what love ought to be," she
said. But he saw that her reproof was milder.

"I know," he insisted. "You've sung it to me----"

"No--not to you--not love," she said, startled. And then, "You had no
right to be listenin'." And then, with a glance at Aunt Tillie's clock,
"You have no right to be here now. It's late."

"But I can't go until you understand what I want to do for you. You say
that I can't know what love is. It asks nothing and only gives. I swear
I wanted to give without thought of a return--until you laughed at me.
And then--I wanted to punish you because you wouldn't understand----"

"Yes. You punished me----"

"Forgive me. You shouldn't have laughed at me, Beth. If you knew
everything, you'd understand that I'm doing it all without a hope of
payment,--just because I've got to."

Her eyes grew larger. "What do you mean?"

"I can't tell you now--but something has happened that will make a great
difference to you."

"What?"

"Forgive me. Come to-morrow and perhaps I'll tell you. We've already
wasted two days."

"I'm not so sure they've been wasted," said Beth quietly.

"I don't care if you'll only come. Will you, Beth? To-morrow?"

She nodded gravely at last.

"Perhaps," she said. And then, gently, "Good-night, Mr. Nichols."

So Peter kissed her fingers as though she had been his Czarina and went
out.

CHAPTER XV

SUPERMAN

Of course Beth Cameron knew nothing of Russia's grand dukes. The only
Duke that she had ever met was in the pages of the novel she had read in
which the hero was named Algernon. That Duk