uage.

"And--and you love me! It seems so wonderful!" she murmured, looking at
him with her eyes, now deep as violets and dewy with her tears. "So
wonderful! Why--why do you?"

He laughed--the laugh that for the first time in his life had left his
lips.

"Have you no looking-glass in your room, Nell?" he asked. "You beautiful
angel! But not only because you are the loveliest----"

She put her hand to his lips, her face crimson; but he kissed it and
laid it against his cheek.

--"You are not only the loveliest woman I know, but the sweetest, Nell,"
he said. "No man could help loving you."

"How foolish!" she breathed; but, ah! the joy, the innocent pride that
shone in her eyes! "You must have met, known, hundreds of beautiful
women. I never thought that I--that any one could care for me----"

"Because there's not a spark of vanity in my Nell, thank God!" he said.
"See here, dearest, you speak of other women--it is because you are
unlike any other woman I have ever known--thank God again!--because you
are so. Ah, Nell! it's easier to love you than to tell you why. All I
know is that I'm the happiest man on earth; that I don't deserve----"
His voice grew grave and his face clouded. "The best of us doesn't
deserve the love of the worst woman; and I, who have got the sweetest,
the dearest----Ah, Nell! if you knew how bad a bargain you have made!"

She laid her face against his hand, and her lips touched it with a kiss,
and she laughed softly, as one laughs for mere joy which pants for
adequate expression.

"I am satisfied--ah, yes! I am satisfied!" she whispered. "It is you who
have made the bad bargain--an ignorant girl--just a girl! Why, Dick will
laugh at you! And mamma will think you are too foolish for words."

He looked down at her--he was sitting on the bowlder now, and she was on
the sand at his feet, her head resting against him, his arm round her.

"Mrs. Lorton knows nothing about me," he said. "I'm afraid, when she
knows----"

His words did not affect her. In a sense, she was scarcely noting them.
This new happiness, this unspeakable joy, was taking complete possession
of her. That his lips should have touched hers, that his arm should be
round her, that her head should be resting against him, his kisses upon
her hair, was all so wonderful that she could scarcely realize it. Would
she awake presently and find that she was in her own room, with the
pillow wet with the tears that had fallen because "Mr