long as you live. It's grubby, narrow
work, and there's so much else in life, so much that's beautiful and--and
wonderful--"

For a fleeting moment a picture arose before Mary's eyes: a tired woman
bending over a wash-tub with a crying child tugging at her skirt. "So
much that's beautiful--and wonderful"--the words were still echoing
around her, and almost without thinking she said a peculiar thing.
"Suppose we were poor," said she.

"But we aren't poor," smiled Wally. "That's one reason why I want to take
you away from this. What's the use of having things if you can't enjoy
them?"

She thought that over.

"There is so much that I have always wanted to see," he continued, "but
I've had sense enough to wait until I found the right girl--so we could
go and see it together. Switzerland--and the Nile--and Japan--and the
Riviera, with 'its skies for ever blue.' Any place we liked, we could
stay till we were tired of it. And a house in New York--and an island in
the St. Lawrence--or down near Palm Beach. There's nothing we couldn't
do--nothing we couldn't have--"

"But don't you think--" hesitated Mary and then stopped, timid of
breaking the spell which was stealing over her.

"Don't I think what, dear?"

"Oh, I don't know--but you see so many married people, who seem to have
lost interest in each other--nice people, too. You see them at North East
Harbor--Boston--everywhere--and somehow they are bored at each other's
company. Wouldn't it be awful if--if we were to be married--and then got
like that, too?"

"We never, never could! Oh, we couldn't! You know as well as I do that we
couldn't!"

"They must have felt that way once," she mused, her thoughts still upon
the indifferent ones, "but I suppose if people were awfully careful to
guard against it, they wouldn't get that way--"

She felt Wally's arm along the back of the bench.

"Don't be afraid of love, Mary," he whispered. "Don't you know by now
that it's the one great thing in life?"

"I wonder...." breathed Mary.

"Oh, but it is. You shouldn't wonder. It's the sweetest story ever
told--the greatest adventure ever lived--"

But still old dreams echoed in her memory, though growing fainter with
every breath she drew.

"It's all right for the man," she murmured. "If he gets tired of hearing
the story, he's got other thoughts to occupy his mind. He's got his
work--his career. But what's the woman going to do?"

Instinct told him how to answer her.

"