ing will be cleared up, and this mysterious
cloud lifted from you. Look at me, dear!" Leonie turned and looked at
him blankly, and as he continued speaking, slowly, and as though
against her will, turned her eyes back to the poinsettia bush. "I want
you now in your distress. I want you in the storm as well as in the
sunshine, dear; I love to see you smile, it would be heaven to _make_
you smile. Marry me, beloved, _now_. Dear, won't you? Let me lift
the cloud from my _wife_. Oh! Leonie, think of it--my _wife_!"

Leonie answered mechanically, as though she were repeating a lesson and
had not heard one word of the man's pleading.

"What have you found out? And what is missing?"

"I have found the woman who was your ayah."

Leonie pulled her hands away, and pushing the hair off her forehead,
sat quite still listening, but not hearing the music as it floated
through the night air, watching without seeing the couples as they
strolled about the grounds.

And then she answered, but without any real interest, although very
distinctly, shivering slightly as the man put the wrap over her bare
shoulders.

"Have you? And who is she, really? Of course I know her
name--but--but what do you know about her? I have had no answer to my
letters since I've been out here, is the poor thing still working?"

"She's--not exactly working for a living, dear, and she is--is----"

He stopped short with a world of perplexity in his eyes, then went on
as slowly and mechanically as Leonie had done.

"Perhaps, dear, I--I had--better not say any more until--until I have
everything quite clear."

And he drew his hand sharply across his eyes as Leonie sighed.

"Very well!" she replied gently. "Just as you think best."

"Tell me you love me, Leonie, let me be sure of that, let me just hear
you say it once."

She put out both her hands, and he took them and kissed them.

"Dear, do you count me as _so_ little? Don't you know, cannot you feel
that a love like mine endures for ever?"

"Do you still want the little white house behind the white
wall--Leonie, _do_ you!"

"Oh! Jan!"

"Well, marry me--marry me, beloved, and give me the right to protect
you--from trouble, and these slanderous, murderous tongues."

Leonie's face was lovely to behold, swept by a wave of colour, and with
eyes like stars; but she shook her head although a little smile parted
the crimson mouth.

"No! Jan! Nothing will make me change. Not until we