"I would rather not. Every one will have his testimony to raise against it, and I should get cross." "Then good night, bairnies. I must not keep the minister waiting. Maybe I'll be beyond your time. Don't lose your beauty sleep for me." He left the room in a hurry, and in a few minutes the "bairnies" heard the crunch of the retreating wheels upon the gravel. Mary continued at the piano, lightly running over with one hand the music she happened to turn. Allan stood on the hearth watching her. Both were intensely and uncomfortably conscious of their position. At length Allan said, "Mary, suppose you cease playing, and talk with me!" "Very well." She rose slowly and turned with affected reluctance. Affected, because she really wished for some satisfactory conversation with him. The recollection of their last confidence was painful and humiliating. She could hardly bear the idea of carrying its memory throughout two years. Few as the steps were between herself and Allan, she determined, as she took them, to speak with all the candor which her position gave her the right to use; and at any rate, not to end their interview again in debt to self-esteem. The strength of the Scotch mind is in its interrogative quality, and instinctively Mary fell behind the cover of a question. "Why should we talk, Allan? Is there any thing you can say that will unsay the words you have spoken?" "You were not fair with me, Mary. You took me up before I had finished my explanation." "Oh, I think there was enough said." "You made words hard to me, Mary. You forgot that we had been brought up together on terms of perfect confidence. I always held you as my sister. I told you all my boyish secrets, all the troubles and triumphs of my college life, all my youthful entanglements. I had few, very few, secrets from you. I think we both understood by implication--rather than by explanation--that it was our father's intention to unite the two branches of the Drumloch family, and so also unite their wealth by our marriage." "I never understood there was any such intention. No one ever spoke to me of it. But if the plan had been possible, it was a wise plan; any sensible parents would have conceived it, and hoped and worked for its accomplishment." "When I left home last spring--if I had thought you cared for me--one word would have detained me." "Was it my place to say that word? And, Allan, you would not have been moved by any word at that time. You thought only of asserting yourself, your rights, your inclinations. The crown of England would not have fitted you, unless it had been your gracious will to select it." "A man must have some individuality--"