hope you will be pleased, Patty. I would not for all the world do anything to vex you." "Vex me, my pet, by your marriage with a good man? Can anything vex me that will secure happiness for you?" "Yes, I am sure I shall be happy with him. He is so good." The secret in my own heart should have taught me to read hers better than I did. If I could have truly read that innocent heart, how much pain, how much anguish might have been spared! There would have been sorrow, perhaps, but only a gentle sorrow as compared with what came afterwards. "It was all so sudden, Patty," said my sister presently, "that I think, even if I had not known and loved my cousin as I do, that I should have been startled into saying Yes. You remember when Bernard came into St. Augustine's this afternoon while we were decorating the font? You left us, you know, dear, to pay the old women their club money, and while you were in the vestry my cousin began to talk to me. I was standing with the last of our garlands in my hand, very tired, and Bernard was leaning against the font, looking down at me with those awfully searching grey eyes of his, which would turn my heart cold if I were very wicked. I can't remember what words he used, Patty, or how he came upon the subject so suddenly, and yet quite naturally, as it seemed, but I know that all at once he was telling me that he loved me, and had set his heart on winning my love. He did not tell me of my uncle's wish until afterwards, and then he said, 'Remember, Sophy, however sacred this wish may be to me, it must not turn the scale by so much as a feather's weight. I love you too dearly to accept less than your love, freely given, for myself alone. You are so young that any error as to this matter would be fatal. Unless you can give me all your heart, Sophy, give me your hand now and be only my friend and sister from this time forward. I am strong enough to bear a disappointment, and you shall never be reminded of what I have told you to-day. You must think how solemn a question this seems to me, when I ask it in such a sacred place.' It was something like this that he said to me, as we stood by the font. He spoke very earnestly, but with that proud manner which he has sometimes. He wasn't a bit like a lover in a novel, and I think if I had said No, he would have taken it as quietly as the most commonplace answer to a commonplace question. And yet, Patty, I do believe he loves me very dearly." "And you love him, darling?" "How can I help loving him," she asked again, simply, "when he is so good? And now come and dress, Patty. It must be nearly six o'clock." We found our candle on a table in the hall, and lighted it at |