old man."

"It is not that," she muttered.

"But I think that I can love you as honestly and as firmly as a younger one. I think that if you could bring yourself to be my wife, you would find that you would not be treated badly."

"Oh, no, no, no!" she exclaimed.

"Nothing, at any rate, would be kept from you. When I have a thought or a feeling, a hope or a fear, you shall share it. As to money—"

money—"

"Don't do that. There should be no talk of money from you to me."

"Perhaps not. It would be best that I should be left to do as I may think most fitting for you. I have one incident in my life which I would wish to tell you. I loved a girl,—many years since,—and she ill-used me. I continued to love her long, but that image has passed from my mind." He was thinking, as he said this, of Mrs Compas and her large family. "It will not be necessary that I should refer to this again, because the subject is very painful; but it was essential that I should tell you. And now, Mary, how shall it be?" he added, after a pause.

She sat listening to all that he had to say to her, but without speaking a word. He, too, had had his "John Gordon;" but in his case the girl he had loved had treated him badly. She, Mary, had received no bad treatment. There had been love between them, ample love, love enough to break their hearts. At least she had found it so. But there had been no outspoken speech of love. Because of that, the wound made, now that it had been in some sort healed, had not with her been so cruel as with Mr Whittlestaff. John Gordon had come to her on the eve of his going, and had told her that he was about to start for some distant land. There had been loud words between him and her step-mother, and Mrs Lawrie had told him that he was a pauper, and was doing no good about the house; and Mary had heard the words spoken. She asked him whither he was going, but he did not reply. "Your mother is right. I am at any rate doing no good here," he had said, but had not answered her question further. Then Mary had given him her hand, and had whispered, "Good-bye." "If I return," he added, "the first place I will come to shall be Norwich." Then without further farewell ceremony he had gone. From that day to this she had had his form before her eyes; but now, if she accepted Mr Whittlestaff, it must be banished. No one, at any 

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