be a different person altogether, and you will cease to care for me."

"I shall always adore you, Phyllis," declares my lover, earnestly, "whether we live together for four or fourteen or one hundred and fourteen years."

This leaves nothing more to be said, so I am silent for a moment or two, and gaze at him with some degree of pride as he stands beside me, with his blue eyes, tender and impassioned—as handsome a man as ever made vain love to a graceless maiden. Still, admirable as he is, I have no desire for him to grow demonstrative so soon again; therefore continue the conversation hastily.

"Were you never in love before?" I ask, without motive. It occurs to me that like a flash a faint change crosses his face.

"All men have fancies," he answers, and something tells me he is evading a strict reply.

"I don't mean a fancy: I mean a real attachment. Did you ever ask any woman except me to be your wife?"

"Why?" he asks, with an attempt at laughter that ends in dismal failure beneath my remorseless eyes. "Will you throw me over if I say, 'Yes?'"

"No, of course not. But I think you might have told me before. Here have you been pretending all along you never loved anyone but me, and now I discover accidentally that long before you knew me you had broken your heart over dozens of women."

"I had not," angrily. "Why do you misconstrue my words?"

"Oh, of course you had."

"I really wish, Phyllis, you would not give yourself the habit of contradicting people so rudely. I tell you I had not."

"Well, you were madly in love with one, at all events," I say, viciously. "I could see that by your eyes when I asked you the question."

"If a man commits a folly once in his life, he is not to be eternally condemned for it, I suppose?"

"I never said it was a folly to love anyone; I only suggested it was deceitful of you not to have told about it before. I hate secrets of any kind." My companion winces visibly. "There don't be uneasy," I say, loftily. "I have no desire to pry into any of your affairs."

We pace up and down in uncomfortable silence. At length:

"I see you are angry, Phyllis," he says.

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