Nan was silent again for a little, but she still held fast to his hand.

"Were you," she asked hesitatingly at length, "were you--making love to
me--that night?"

"After my own savage fashion," he said.

"Well," she said, a slight quiver in her voice, "it didn't hurt me,
Piet."

Piet was silent.

"I mean," she said, gathering courage, "if--if I had known that it meant
just that, I--well, I shouldn't have minded so much."

Still Piet was silent. His hand shaded his eyes, but she knew that he was
watching her.

"Do you understand?" she asked him doubtfully.

"No," he said.

"Don't you--don't you know what I want you to do?" she said, rather
Breathlessly.

"No," he said again.

"Must I--tell you?" she asked, with a gasp.

"I think you must," he said, in his grave way.

She lifted her head abruptly. Her eyes were very big and shining. She
stretched her hands out to him with a little, quivering laugh.

"I hate you for making me say it!" she declared, with a vehemence half
passionate, half whimsical. "Piet, I--I want you--to--to--take me in your
arms again, and--and--kiss me--as you did--that night."

The last words were uttered from his breast, though she never knew how
she came to be there. It was as though a whirlwind had caught her away
from the earth into a sunlit paradise that was all her own--a paradise in
which fear had no place. And the chain against which she had chafed so
long and bitterly had turned to links of purest gold.

* * * * *

The Consolation Prize

"So you don't want to marry me?" said Earl Wyverton.

He said it by no means bitterly. There was even the suggestion of a smile
on his clean-shaven face. He looked down at the girl who stood before
him, with eyes that were faintly quizzical. She was bending at the moment
to cut a tall Madonna lily from a sheaf that grew close to the path. At
his quiet words she started and the flower fell.

He stooped and picked it up, considered it for a moment, then slipped it
into the basket that was slung on her arm.

"Don't be agitated," he said, gently. "You needn't take me
seriously--unless you wish."

She turned a face of piteous entreaty towards him. She was trembling
uncontrollably. "Oh, please, Lord Wyverton," she said, earnestly,
"please, don't ask me! Don't ask me! I--I felt so sure you wouldn't."

"Did you?" he said. "Why?"

He looked at her with grave inter