our duty to deny it, and brand the man who takes it up for you as a liar and the slanderer of an honest girl?" 

 "That's what I came here for," she said curtly, then, regarding them curiously, and running her ringed hand up and down the railed back of her chair, she added, with a half laugh, "What are you playin' me for, boys?" 

 "But," said Colonel Pendleton, without heeding her, "are you ready to know that in sickness or affliction you will be powerless to help her; that a stranger will take your place at her bedside, that as she has lived without knowing you she will die without that knowledge, or that if through any weakness of yours it came to her then, it would embitter her last thoughts of earth and, dying, she would curse you?" 

 The smile upon her half-open mouth still fluttered around it, and her curved fingers still ran up and down the rails of the chair-back as if they were the cords of some mute instrument, to which she was trying to give voice. Her rings once or twice grated upon them as if she had at times gripped them closely. But she rose quickly when he paused, said "Yes," sharply, and put the chair back against the wall. 

 "Then I will send you copies of this tomorrow, and take an assignment of the property." 

 "I've got the check here for it now," she said, drawing it from her pocket and laying it upon the desk.  "There, I reckon that's finished. Good-by!" 

 The Mayor took up his hat, Colonel Pendleton did the same; both men preceded her to the door, and held it open with grave politeness for her to pass. 

 "Where are you boys going?" she asked, glancing from the one to the other. 

 "To see you to your carriage, Mrs. Howard," said the Mayor, in a voice that had become somewhat deeper. 

 "Through the whole building? Past all the people in the hall and on the stairs? Why, I passed Dan Stewart as I came in." 

 "If you will allow us?" he said, turning half appealing to Colonel Pendleton, who, without speaking, made a low bow of assent. 

 A slight flush rose to her face—the first and only change in the even healthy color she had shown during the interview. 

 "I reckon I won't trouble you, boys, if it's all the same to you," she said, with her half-strident laugh.  "YOU 

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