not listen!" A bright spot burned on either cheek, and the little hand resting on the chair back clinched itself tighter. Olive Girard drew a step nearer the now angry girl, and searched her face with grave eyes. "If I said you were standing on the verge of a horrible precipice, that your life and soul were in danger, would you listen then?" she asked, sternly. "No," said Madeline, doggedly, drawing farther away as she spoke; "not unless I saw the danger with my own eyes. And[71] in that case I should not need your warning," she added, dryly. [71] "And when your own eyes see the danger, it will be too late to avert it," said Olive, bitterly. "I know your feeling at this moment, and I know the heartache sure to follow your rashness. What are you, and what do you hope or expect to be, to the man you call Lucian Davlin?" She spoke his name as if it left the taste of poison in her mouth. The girl's head dropped until it rested on the hands clasped upon the chair before her; cold fingers seemed clutched upon her heart. Across her memory came trooping all his love words of the past, and among them,—she remembered it now for the first time,—among them all, the word wife had never once been uttered. In that moment, a thought new and terrible possessed her soul; a new and baleful light seemed shining upon the pictures of the past, imparting to each a shameful, terrible meaning. She uttered a low moan like that of some wounded animal, and suddenly uplifting her head, turned upon Olive Girard a face in which passion and a vague terror were strangely mingled. "What are you saying? What are you daring to say to me!" she ejaculated, in tones half angry, half terror-stricken, wholly pitiful. "What horrible thing are you trying to torture me with?" She would have spoken in indignation, but the new thought in her heart frightened the wrath from her voice. She dared not say "I am to be his wife," with these forebodings whispering darkly within her. She turned away from the one who had conjured up these spectres, and throwing herself upon a couch, buried her face in the cushions, and remained in this attitude while Olive answered her and for long moments after; moments that seemed hours to both. Olive's eyes were full of pity, and her tone was very
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