why you
were so--so sad. I mean--oh, I know you laugh and talk and are kind, but
somehow I felt all the time there was a sadness underneath...."

She broke off, roused from thoughts of her own trouble by the fear that
she had given him pain; and for a moment neither spoke.

Then, with a glance at the window, down whose panes the rain was still
streaming, Herrick took a sudden resolution.

Perhaps if he told this girl the story of his own marriage, opened
before her eyes the book on whose pages was inscribed so tragic a
history, she might take courage anew, realizing that her own pitiful
little story held no hint, at least, of shame or disgrace, no hint of a
mutual disillusionment which only death could adjust.

He rose abruptly.

"I'll just speak to your man," he said. "I don't think it would be wise
to start yet, but I'll see what he says, shall I?"

She let him go, wondering whether her last speech had vexed him; and in
a moment he returned.

"Fletcher agrees with me that it will be wise to wait a quarter of an
hour," he said; "the rain is not nearly so heavy, and the sky is growing
lighter."

"Very well." She spoke listlessly, and his resolve was strengthened.
Sitting down on the window seat again, he asked her a question.

"You didn't know I was married? Would you care to hear the story of my
marriage? It isn't a very happy story, but it might serve to show you
what a different thing your marriage will yet turn out to be."

"I should like to hear what you can tell me," Toni said slowly; and
after a moment's hesitation Herrick began the story which he had rightly
called unhappy.

CHAPTER XVII

"It is just four years since I met the girl who was to be my wife. I was
taking a holiday in Ireland at the time; and daring a visit to an old
friend in Dublin I was introduced to a certain Mr. Payton, an Irish
squire, who had brought his two daughters up from the country for a few
weeks' gaiety. Well, we took a fancy to one another. I was always a
queer sort of chap, hating convention and all the trammels of society,
and I liked the old man at once. He was a big, jolly old boy, a thorough
sportsman and Irish to the backbone. Poor as a rat, yet living somehow
like a Prince; hospitable to a fault, and looking on debts and duns in
the light of a joke."

He paused for a second, then went on quietly:

"I went back with him and his two girls after their Dublin visit was
ended. They were all very kind to me,