She sprang to his side, and putting her arm around his neck said, "Graydon, on the evening after your return I told you I couldn't be your sister. You know why now, and you uttered these words, 'I shall have to take you as you are if I ever find out.' I meant to win you if I could, but only by being such a girl as I thought you would love. Now you know the mystery of the little ghost, and you can bring to me that 'idiot' who didn't return my love, as often as you choose." "Thank Heaven for what I escaped! Thank God for what I have won!" he exclaimed. "Won? Nonsense! _You_ have been won, not I. Oh, Graydon, wouldn't you have been amazed and horrified if you had been told, years ago, that the little ghost would go deliberately to work to woo a man and take him from another girl? Think how dreadful it sounds! but you shall now know the worst." "It's music that will fill my life with gladness. How exquisitely fine your nature is, that you could do this with such absolute maidenly reserve! Suppose I had become Stella Wildmere's bondman?" "I should have gone back to Santa Barbara, and kept my secret." "Horrible!" "I said you knew all, but I am mistaken. Now, don't be shocked back into your kind of unconsciousness again. I did another horrid thing. I listened and learned about the plot by which Arnault meant to bring Miss Wildmere to a decision against you;" and she told him the circumstances, and what had passed between herself and Henry. His arm tightened around her almost convulsively. "Madge," he cried, "you have not only brought me happiness--you have saved me from a bitter, lifelong self-reproach far worse than poverty. How can I ever show sufficient devotion in return for all this?" "By being sensible, and telling me how to make signals, now that it is as dark as it will be this moonlight night." "Let me lean on you, as I ever shall figuratively hereafter. We will go down to the outlook you found, build another fire, and wave burning brands." This was done. Henry Muir, who had grown very solicitous, saw their signals, and promptly organized a rescuing party. A wood-road led well up toward their position, and with the aid of some employés of the house he at last rescued them. Graydon was weak and exhausted from pain by the time he reached the hotel, yet felt that his happiness had been purchased at very slight cost. The next day he was taken to his city home, and Madge filled the days of his convalescence with such varied entertainment that he threatened to break his leg again. She had so trained her voice that she read or sang with almost tireless ease. To furnish home music, to shine in the light of her own hearth, had been the dream of her ambition; and to the man she had won she made that hearth the centre of the gentle force which controlled and blessed his life.