a very good
match. You can let them build on the other corner of the lot, if Ellen
is going to be in New York. I would miss Lottie more than Ellen about
the housekeeping, though the dear knows I will miss them both badly
enough."

"Well, you can break off their engagements," said the judge.

As yet, and until Ellen was off her hands, Lottie would not allow Mr.
Elroy to consider himself engaged to her. His conditional devotion did
not debar him from a lover's rights, and, until Breckon came on from
New York to be married, there was much more courtship of Lottie than
of Ellen in the house. But Lottie saved herself in the form if not the
fact, and as far as verbal terms were concerned, she was justified by
them in declaring that she would not have another sop hanging round.

It was Boyne, and Boyne alone, who had any misgivings in regard to
Ellen's engagement, and these were of a nature so recondite that when
he came to impart them to his mother, before they left Scheveningen, and
while there was yet time for that conclusion which his father suggested
to Mrs. Kenton too late, Boyne had an almost hopeless difficulty in
stating them. His approaches, even, were so mystical that his mother was
forced to bring him to book sharply.

"Boyne, if you don't tell me right off just what you mean, I don't know
what I will do to you! What are you driving at, for pity's sake? Are you
saying that she oughtn't to be engaged to Mr. Breckon?"

"No, I'm not saying that, momma," said Boyne, in a distress that caused
his mother to take a reef in her impatience.

"Well, what are you saying, then?"

"Why, you know how Ellen is, momma. You know how conscientious
and--and--sensitive. Or, I don't mean sensitive, exactly."

"Well?"

"Well, I don't think she ought to be engaged to Mr. Breckon out
of--gratitude."

"Gratitude?"

"Yes. I just know that she thinks--or it would be just like her--that he
saved me that day. But he only met me about a second before we came
to her and poppa, and the officers were taking me right along towards
them." Mrs. Kenton held herself stormily in, and he continued: "I know
that he translated for us before the magistrate, but the magistrate
could speak a little English, and when he saw poppa he saw that it was
all right, anyway. I don't want to say anything against Mr. Breckon, and
I think he behaved as well any one could; but if Ellen is going to marry
him out of gratitude for saving me--"

Mrs. Kenton co