iven to a certain Eton master, of a type happily not uncommon
in English public schools. Herbert French had been Roger's earliest and
best friend. What Roger had owed him at school, only he knew. Since
school-days they had been constant correspondents, and French's
influence on his pupil's early manhood had done much, for all Roger's
laziness and self-indulgence, to keep him from serious lapses.

Neglect any friends of his--and such jolly friends? Rather not! But as
soon as Daphne had seen Elsie Maddison, and he had begged an afternoon
to go on an expedition with them, Daphne had become intolerable. She had
shown her English friend and his acquaintances a manner so insulting and
provocative, that the young man's blood had boiled.

If he were in love with her--well and good! She might no doubt have
tamed him by these stripes. But she was no goddess to him; no golden
cloud enveloped her; he saw her under a common daylight. At the same
time she attracted him; he was vain of what had seemed his conquest, and
uneasily exultant in the thought of her immense fortune. "I'll make her
an excellent husband if she marries me," he said to himself stubbornly;
"I can, and I will."

But meanwhile how was this first stage to end? At the White House that
night Daphne had treated him with contumely, and before spectators. He
must either go or bring her to the point.

He withdrew suddenly from the window, flinging out the end of his
cigarette. "I'll propose to her to-morrow--and she may either take me or
leave me!"

He paced up and down his room, conscious of relief and fresh energy. As
he did so his eyes were drawn to a letter from Herbert French lying on
the table. He took it up and read it again--smiling over it broadly, in
a boyish and kindly amusement. "By Jove! he's happy."

Then as he put it down his face darkened. There was something in the
letter, in its manliness and humour, its unconscious revelation of
ideals wholly independent of dollars, that made Roger for the moment
loathe his own position. But he pulled himself together.

"I shall make her a good husband," he repeated, frowning. "She'll have
nothing to complain of."

* * * * *

On the following day a picnic among the woods of the Upper Potomac
brought together most of the personages in this history. The day was
beautiful, the woods fragrant with spring leaf and blossom, and the
stream, swollen with rain, ran seaward in a turbid, rej