"Do you?" asked Lucian, picking up the rose again.

"How can I reply to your parables, or read your dark sayings?" said
Diana, half in earnest, half in mirth.

"I can speak plainer if you permit it."

"If--if you like!"

The young man laid the rose on Diana's lap. "Then in return for my rose
give me--yourself!"

"Mr. Denzil!" cried Diana, starting up, whereby the flower fell to the
ground. "You--you surprise me!"

"Indeed, I surprise myself," said Lucian sadly. "That I should dare to
raise my eyes to you is no doubt surprising."

"I don't see that at all," exclaimed Diana coldly. "I like to be woo'd
like a woman, not honoured like a goddess."

"You are both woman and goddess! But--you are not angry?"

"Why should I be angry?"

"Because I--I love you!"

"I cannot be angry with--with--shall we say a compliment."

"Oh, Diana!"

"Wait! wait!" cried Miss Vrain, waving back this too eager lover. "You
cannot love me! You have known me only a month or two."

"Love can be born in an hour," cried Lucian eagerly. "I loved you on the
first day I saw you! I love you now--I shall love you ever!"

"Will you truly love me ever, Lucian?"

"Oh, my darling! Can you doubt it? And you?" He looked at her hopefully.

"And I?" she repeated in a pretty mocking tone, "and I?" With a laugh,
she bent and picked up the flower. "I take the rose and I give you--"

"Yourself!" cried the enraptured lover, and the next moment he was
clasping her to his breast. "Oh, Diana, dearest! Will you really be my
wife?"

"Yes," she said softly, and kissed him.

For a few moments the emotions of both overcame them too much to permit
further speech; then Diana sat down and made Lucian sit beside her.

"Lucian," she said in a firm voice, "I love you, and I shall be your
wife--when you find out who killed my poor father!"

"It is impossible!" he cried in dismay.

"No. We must prosecute the search. I have no right to be happy while the
wretch who killed him is still at large. We have failed hitherto, but we
may succeed yet! and when we succeed I shall marry you."

"My darling!" cried Lucian in ecstasy; and then in a more subdued tone:
"I'll do all I can to find out the truth. But, after all, from what
point can I begin afresh?"

"From the point of Mrs. Vrain," said Diana unexpectedly.

"Mrs. Vrain!" cried the startled Lucian. "Do you still suspect her?"

"Yes, I do!"

"But she has cleared herself on the most undeniable evidence."