, but if you
are still here we shall meet, no doubt. You must be sure and come to
see us." She turned to an east court-window, where the morning sun was
gleaming on some flowers in a window-box, and began to pinch off a dead
leaf here and there.

Braxmar, full of the tradition of American romance, captivated by her
vibrant charm, her poise and superiority under the circumstances, her
obvious readiness to dismiss him, was overcome, as the human mind
frequently is, by a riddle of the spirit, a chemical reaction as
mysterious to its victim as to one who is its witness. Stepping
forward with a motion that was at once gallant, reverent, eager,
unconscious, he exclaimed:

"Berenice! Miss Fleming! Please don't send me away like this. Don't
leave me. It isn't anything I have done, is it? I am mad about you. I
can't bear to think that anything that has happened could make any
difference between you and me. I haven't had the courage to tell you
before, but I want to tell you now. I have been in love with you from
the very first night I saw you. You are such a wonderful girl! I don't
feel that I deserve you, but I love you. I love you with all the honor
and force in me. I admire and respect you. Whatever may or may not be
true, it is all one and the same to me. Be my wife, will you? Marry
me, please! Oh, I'm not fit to be the lacer of your shoes, but I have
position and I'll make a name for myself, I hope. Oh, Berenice!" He
extended his arms in a dramatic fashion, not outward, but downward,
stiff and straight, and declared: "I don't know what I shall do without
you. Is there no hope for me at all?"

An artist in all the graces of sex--histrionic, plastic,
many-faceted--Berenice debated for the fraction of a minute what she
should do and say. She did not love the Lieutenant as he loved her by
any means, and somehow this discovery concerning her mother shamed her
pride, suggesting an obligation to save herself in one form or another,
which she resented bitterly. She was sorry for his tactless proposal
at this time, although she knew well enough the innocence and virtue of
the emotion from which it sprung.

"Really, Mr. Braxmar," she replied, turning on him with solemn eyes,
"you mustn't ask me to decide that now. I know how you feel. I'm
afraid, though, that I may have been a little misleading in my manner.
I didn't mean to be. I'm quite sure you'd better forget your interest
in me for the present anyhow. I c