that letter without thinking well over it."

"Perhaps she'll tell my mother her reasons. Perhaps she'll say why she
draws back from her promise."

"I don't even know that I'd like to drive her to that; it mightn't be
quite fair."

Tony flung away his cigar with impatience; he was irritated, for he
bethought him of his own case, and how it was quite possible that no
such scruples of delicacy would have interfered with him if he could
only have managed to find out what was passing in Alice's mind.

"I 'm sure," said M'Gruder, "you agree with me, Tony; and if she says,
'Don't hold me to my pledge,' I have no right to ask why."

A short shrug of the shoulders was all Tony's answer.

"Not that I 'd object to your saying a word for me, Tony, if there was
to be any hope from it,--saying what a warm friend could say of one he
thought well of. You 've been living under the same roof with me, and
you know more of my nature, and my ways and my temper, than most men,
and mayhap what you could tell her might have its weight."

"That I know and believe."

"But don't think only of me, Tony. _She's_ more to be considered than
I am; and if this bargain was to be unhappy for her, it would only be
misery for both of us. You'd not marry your own sweetheart against her
own will?"

Tony neither agreed to nor dissented from this remark. The chances were
that it was a proposition not so readily solved, and that he 'd like to
have thought over it.

"No; I know you better than that," said M'Gruder, once more.

"Perhaps not," remarked Tony; but the tone certainly gave no positive
assurance of a settled determination. "At all events, I 'll see what I
can do for you."

"If it was that she cares for somebody else that she could n't
marry,--that her father disliked, or that he was too poor,--I 'd never
say one word; because who can tell what changes may come in life, and
the man that could n't support a wife now, in a year or two may be well
off and thriving? And if it was that she really liked another,--you
don't think that likely? Well, neither do I; but I say it here because I
want to take in every consideration of the question; but I repeat, if
it were so, I 'd never utter one word against it. Your mother, Tony, is
more likely to find _that_ out than any of us; and if she says Dolly's
heart is given away already, that will be enough. I 'll not trouble nor
torment her more."

Tony grasped his friend's hand and shook it warmly, so