"Well, heaven itself can't save a fool," said Mrs. Almar, and she went
out of the room, and slammed the door after her.

As she went, Riatt actually flung the hand of his newly affianced wife
from him. "May I ask," he said, "what you think you are doing?"

Christine had covered her face with her hands, and had sunk into a chair.
For an instant Riatt really thought that the strain of the situation had
been too much for her; but on closer inspection he found that she was
shaking with laughter.

"I can't be sure which was funnier," she gasped, "your face or Nancy's."

Riatt did not seem to feel mirthful. "Do you take in," he asked her
sternly, "that you have just broken your word."

"I've just plighted it, haven't I?"

"You promised to refuse me."

She sprang up. "I did not. I never said a word like it. If a stenographer
had been here, the record would bear me out. You inferred it, I dare say.
Besides, what could I do? Even Nancy herself told us no one would believe
us unless I accepted you--at least for a time."

"For what time?"

"Oh, don't let us cross bridges until we get to them. We are hardly
engaged yet--Max! I must practise calling you Max, mustn't I?" In
attempting to repress an irrepressible smile she developed an unknown
dimple in her left cheek. The sight of it made his tone particularly
relentless as he answered:

"If by the fifteenth of this month you have not broken this engagement,
I'll announce its termination myself."

"And you," she went on, as if he had not spoken, "must get into the habit
of calling me Christine."

"Listen to me," he said, and he took her by the shoulders with a
gesture that no one could have mistaken for a caress. "I do not intend
to marry you."

"I see you feel no doubt of my wishes in the matter."

"I wonder where I got the idea."

"Be reassured," she said, finding herself released. "My intentions are
honorable. I would not marry any really nice man absolutely against his
will. Although I did say to myself the very first time I saw you, coming
downstairs in that well-cut coat of yours--or is it the shoulders?--I did
say: 'I could be happy with that man, happier, that is, than with Ned.'
You may think it isn't much of a compliment, but Ned has a very nice
disposition, nicer than yours."

"And I should say it was the first requisite for your husband."

She became suddenly plaintive. "Of course I can see," she said, "why any
one shouldn't want to be married, but