o me after days of pondering.

"I am not saying these things that I may marry you. I am saying them
because they are true. Surely we can find a way to make Bettina happy.
Her youth and loveliness must always win love. The hearts of the boys
at the club are all under her little feet, and Justin--oh, if I only
dared hope that she could care for Justin----

"But marry her I will not, even if I go alone through life.

"For me you are the One Woman, Diana. In these days of separation from
you I have thought of many things, but of none more than this: that we
men, having loved one woman, deceive ourselves, when we lose her, with
the thought that another like her may be found--but she is never
found, and so we go through life half-men, unsatisfied, with hungry
hearts.

"There's a big storm coming. I wish you might go down to the beach and
walk with me in the wind. How often we have walked together in beating
storms, Diana, and have gloried in them--so we would face the storms
of life together; so I cannot face them with any other--or alone.

"Oh, girl, come back to me. I need you. I must have you. I _will_ have
you. You are mine.

"ANTHONY."

The letter dropped from her fingers. She hid her face in her hands. His
call echoed thunderingly in her ears. But she must not listen; she must
not.

She yielded for the moment, however, to the sweetness of his insistent
demand. Curled up in the warm little hollow she dreamed of the things
which might be--putting off, as long as possible, the moment of
decision.

The other letters lay unheeded at her feet. All friendship seemed futile
at such a time. What could Sophie, or Bettina or Justin say which could
match those burning words of her lover?

[Illustration: THE OTHER LETTERS LAY UNHEEDED]

The sun, rising higher, filtered through the branches and fell like
golden rain upon the surface of the pool--the purple shadows gave way to
emerald vistas; a trail of honey-bees traveled unerringly toward a
hidden honey store. It was high noon in the forest!

Diana, waking to the fact that the hours had flown, gathered up her
other letters, and opened the one on top of the pile. It was Justin's.
What could he have to say to her, this boy who lived his life so
lightly?

But when she had read the scrawled words she sat staring at them, hardly
believing the things which had been written.

"DEAR LADY:

"Betty Dolce told me last night of her