“There must, however, at the outset be a clear and distinct understanding between us. Therefore permit me for one moment to speak to you candidly, as a man should to a woman who is his friend. You, Mabel, are young, and—well, you are, as you know, very good-looking—”

“No, really, Mr Greenwood,” she cried, interrupting me and blushing at my compliment, “it is too bad of you. I’m sure—”

“Hear me out, please,” I continued with mock severity. “You are young, you are very good-looking, and you are rich; you therefore possess the three necessary attributes which render a woman eligible in these modern days when sentiment is held of such little account. Well, people who will watch our intimate friendship will, with ill-nature, declare, no doubt, that I am seeking to marry you for your money. I am quite sure the world will say this, but what I want you to promise is to at once refute such a statement. I desire that you and I shall be firm friends, just as we have ever been, without any thought of affection. I may admire you—I confess, now, that I have always admired you—but with a man of my limited means love for you is entirely out of the question. Understand that I do not wish to presume upon the past, now that your father is dead and you are alone. Understand, too, from the very outset that I now give you the hand of firm friendship as I would give it to Reggie, my old schoolfellow and best friend, and that in future I shall safeguard your interests as though they were my own.” And I held out my hands to her.

For a moment she hesitated, for my words had apparently caused her the most profound surprise.

“Very well,” she faltered, glancing for an instant up to my face. “It is a bargain—if you wish it to be so.”

“I wish, Mabel, to carry out the promise I made to your father,” I said. “As you know, I am greatly indebted to him for much generosity, and I wish, therefore, as a mark of gratitude, to stand in his place and protect his daughter—yourself.”

“But were we not, in the first place, both indebted to you?” she said. “If it had not been for Mr Seton and yourself I might have wandered on until I died by the wayside.”

“For what was your father searching?” I asked. “He surely told you?”

“No, he never did. I am in entire ignorance of the reason of his three years of tramping up and down England. He had a distinct object, which he accomplished, but what it actually was he would never 

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