cried Margery.

"Yes," said Martin, his face pallid and his eyes sparkling, "mine. You may
think it is an insult for me to talk this way, but love is love, and it
will spring up where it pleases; and besides, I am not the common sort of
a fellow you may think I am. After saying what I have said, I am bound to
say more. I belong to a good family, and am college bred. I am poor, and I
love nature. I am working to make money to travel and become a naturalist.
I prefer this sort of work because it takes me into the heart of nature. I
am not ashamed of what I am, I am not ashamed of my work, and my object in
life is a nobler one, I think, than the practice of the law, or a great
many other things like it."

Margery stood and looked at him with wide-open eyes. "Do you mean to say,"
she said, "that you want to marry me? It would take years and years for
you to become naturalist enough to support a wife."

"I have made no plans," he said, quickly, "I have no purpose. I did not
intend to tell you now that I love you, but since I have said that, I will
say also that with you to fight for there could be no doubt about my
success. I should be bound to succeed. It would be impossible for me to
fail. As for the years, I would wait, no matter how many they should be."

He spoke with such hot earnestness that Margery involuntarily drew herself
a little away from him. At this the flush went out of his face.

"Oh, Miss Dearborn," he exclaimed, "don't think that I am like that man
out there! Don't think that I will persecute you if you don't wish to hear
me; that I will follow you about and make your life miserable. If you say
to me that you do not wish to see me again, you will never see me again.
Say what you please, and you will find that I am a gentleman."

She could see that now. She felt sure that if she told him she did not
wish ever to see him again he would never appear before her. But what
would he do? She was not in the least afraid of him, but his fierce
earnestness frightened her, not for herself, but for him. Suddenly a
thought struck her.

"Martin," said she, "I don't doubt in the least that what you have said to
me about yourself is true. You are as good as other people, although you
do happen now to be a guide, and perhaps after a while you may be very
well off; but for all that you are a guide, and you are in Mr. Sadler's
employment, and Mr. Sadler's rights and powers are just like gas escaping
from a pipe: they a