ng in your life, Mr. Cleveland."

"I wish you would call me Charlie!" he said impulsively. "Yes. I
proposed to you last night. Wasn't that worth doing?"

She drew her brows together in a quick frown, but she made no reply.
Fisher was drifting towards them. She turned deliberately, her head very
high, and strolled to meet him.

Charlie glanced over his shoulder, stood a moment irresolute, then
walked away more soberly than usual towards the bridge, where he was a
constant and welcome visitor.

V

"There are plenty of fine chaps in the world who aren't to be recognised
as such at first sight," drawled Bertie Richmond to his young cousin,
Molly Erle, who was sitting with her feet on the fender on a very cold
winter evening.

"I'm sure of that," said Mrs. Richmond from the other side of the fire,
with a tender glance at her husband's loosely knit figure. "I never
thought there was an inch of heroism in you, Bertie darling, till that
day when we went punting and we got upset. How brave you were! I've
never forgotten it. It was the beginning of everything."

"It sounds as if it were nearer being the end," remarked Molly, who
systematically avoided all sentiment. "I don't believe myself that any
man can be actually heroic and yet not betray it somehow."

"You're wrong," said Bertie.

"I don't think so," said Molly. She could be quite as obstinate as most
women, and this was a point upon which she was very decided.

"I'll prove it," said Bertie, with quiet determination. "There's a chap
coming with the crowd of sportsmen to-morrow who is the bravest and, I
think, the best fellow I ever met. I shan't tell you who he is. I'll
leave you to find out--if you can. But I don't believe you will."

"I am quite sure I can tell the difference between a looker-on, a mere
loafer, and a man who does," said Molly, with absolute confidence.

"Bet you you don't!" murmured Bertie Richmond, smiling at the ceiling.
"I know the woman's theory so jolly well."

Molly smiled also.

"I'll take your bet, whatever it is, Bertie," she said.

Bertie shook his head.

"No, I don't bet on a dead cert," he said comfortably. "I'll even tell
you the fellow's heroic deeds, and then you'll never spot him. I met him
first in South Africa. He saved my life twice. Once he carried me nearly
a mile under fire, and got wounded in the process. Another time he sat
all night under fire holding a fellow's artery. Since then he has been
knocking about i