e to the consequences of
her actions was a part of her lawless inheritance from the Gays.

"I think him very good-looking, don't you?" she inquired sweetly.

"Good-looking? I should think not--a fat fop like that."

"Is he fat? I didn't notice it--but, of course, I didn't mean that he
was good-looking in your way, Abel."

The small flowerlike shadows trembled across her face, and beneath her
feet the waves churned a creamy foam that danced under her like light.
His eyes warmed to her, yet he held back, gripped by a passion of
jealousy. For the first time he felt that he was brought face to face
with a rival who might prove to have the advantage.

"I am coming over!" called Molly suddenly, and a minute later she stood
in the square sunshine that entered the mill door.

Had he preserved then his manner of distant courtesy, it is probable
that she would have melted, for it was not in her temperament to draw
back while her prey showed an inclination for flight. But it was his
nature to warm too readily and to cool too late, a habit of constitution
which causes, usually, a tragedy in matters of sex.

"You oughtn't to treat me so, Molly!" he exclaimed reproachfully, and
made a step toward her.

"I couldn't help forgetting, could I? It was your place to remind me."

Thrust, to his surprise, upon the defensive he reached for her hand,
which was withdrawn after it had lain an instant in his.

"Well, it was my fault, then," he said with a generosity that did him
small service. "The next time I'll remind you every minute."

She smiled radiantly as he looked at her, and he felt that her
indiscretions, her lack of constancy, her unkindness even, were but the
sportive and innocent freaks of a child. In his rustic sincerity he was
forever at the point of condemning her and forever relenting before the
appealing sweetness of her look. He told himself twenty times a day that
she flirted outrageously with him, though he still refused to admit that
in her heart she was to blame for her flirting. A broad and charitable
distinction divided always the thing that she was from the thing that
she did. It was as if his love discerned in her a quality of soul of
which she was still unconscious.

"Molly," he burst out almost fiercely, "will you marry me?"

The smile was still in her eyes, but a slight frown contracted her
forehead.

"I've told you a hundred times that I shall never marry anybody," she
answered, "but that if I ever