tanding each other long enough; too long. I have never lied
to you yet, Florence, and I am not going to begin now. I will not even
analyze the feeling I have for you, or call it by name. I know this is
an unheard-of-way to talk to a girl, especially one so impressionable as
you; but I cannot help it. There is something about you, Florence, that
keeps me from untruth, when probably under the same circumstances I
would lie to any other woman in the world. I simply know that you
impersonate a desire of my nature ungratified; that without you I have
no wish to live."

Strange and cold-blooded as this proposal would have seemed to a
listener, Florence heard it without a sign. It did not even affect her
with the shock of the unexpected. It was merely a part of that
inevitable something she had anticipated, and had for months watched
slowly taking form.

"I suppose it seems unaccountable to you," the voice went on, "that I
should have been attracted to you in the first place. It has often been
so to me, and I've tried to explain it. Beautiful, you undeniably are,
Florence; but I do not believe it was that. It was, I think, because,
despite your ideals of something which--pardon me--doesn't exist, you
were absolutely natural; and the women I'd met before were the reverse
of that. Like myself, they had tasted of life and found it flat. I
danced with them, drank with them, went the round of so-called gayety
with them; but they repelled me. But you, Florence, are very different.
You make me think of a prairie anemone with the dew on its petals. I
haven't much to offer you save money, which you already have in plenty,
and an empty fame; but I'll play the game fair. I'll take you anywhere
in the world, do anything you wish." Out of the shadow an arm crept
around the girl's waist, closed there, and she did not stir. "I am
writing an English story now, and the principal character, a soldier,
has been ordered to India. To catch the atmosphere, I've got to be on
the spot. The boat I wish to take will leave in ten days. Will you go
with me as my wife?"

The voice paused, and the face so near her own remained motionless,
waiting. Into the pause crept the music of the orchestra--beat, beat,
beat, like the throbbing of a mighty heart. Above it, distinct for an
instant, sounded the tinkle of a woman's laugh; then again silence. It
was now the girl's turn to speak, to answer; but not a sound left her
lips. She had an odd feeling that she w