was looking at him directly
now, sitting erect with a sparkle in her eye.

"Yes," he whispered.

"It was true--then. But it is not now."

"I am so sorry I spoke--" faltered Roderick.

"You need not be," she broke in. "It was quite natural--only--" she
looked at him keenly for a moment as though taking his measure. "May I
ask a favour of you, Mr. McRae?"

"Oh, yes, I should be so glad," he broke out, anxious to make amends.

"Then if you would be so good as to make no mention of--of this. I
shall be living in Algonquin now for some time probably."

She stopped falteringly. She could not confess to this strange young
man that she had come away to this little town where no one knew her
just to escape the curiosity and pity of acquaintances and friends, and
that she was dismayed at meeting one on its very threshold who knew her
secret. She was relieved to find him more anxious to keep it than she
herself.

He assured her that he would not even think of it again, and then he
stumbled upon a remark about the fishing in Lake Algonquin, and the
duck-shooting, two things, he recollected afterwards, in which she
could not possibly be interested, and finally he made his escape. He
leaned over the bow, watching the channel opening out its green arms to
the _Inverness_, and tried to recall all that he had heard about Dick
Wells. Billy Parker, who knew all college gossip, had told him much to
which he had scarcely listened. But he remembered something concerning
a broken engagement. Wells was to have been married in June to the
pretty Miss Murray, Billy had said. She had her trousseau all ready,
and then Dick had gone on a trip to the Old Country alone. No one knew
the reason, though Billy had declared it was the same old
reason--"Another girl."

Roderick McRae's chivalry had never before been called into action
where young women were concerned. Now he felt something new and strong
rising within him. He was suddenly filled with the old spirit which
sent a knight out upon the highway to do doughty deeds for the honour
of a lady, or to right her wrongs. His warm heart was filled with
conflicting emotions, rage at himself for having brought the hurt look
into those soft blue eyes, rage at Wells for being the primary cause of
it, and underneath all a strange, quite unreasonable, feeling of
exhilaration over the fact that he and the girl with the golden hair
and the sad eyes had a secret between them.

They wer