This restatement of the case was dinning itself into his ears for the hundredth time while he was saying “Yes” and “No” to the pretty assistant in mathematics, and praying in his more lucid intervals that Rucker might come early with the motor-car and so forestall any chance of deeper mirings. But Rucker was apparently in no hurry. Miss Richardia played until she was tired; Madame Fortier and Miss Farron excused themselves and went to their duties in the dormitories; Hartridge and Miss Longstreet went to brave the chill of the evening in a pacing constitutional on the veranda; and the group in the music-room was cut down to the Caswells, their guests, and Miss Birrell. At this conjuncture Tregarvon saw that Carfax was about to add insult to injury by leaving him alone with Richardia. The president was talking about some improvements he wished to make in the school gymnasium: would Mr. Carfax be good enough to look the plans over and give a country schoolmaster the benefit of his advice? Tregarvon turned to the nearest window to watch for the headlamps of the expected auto. They were not yet in sight; and when the silence behind him gave token that Carfax and the Caswells had gone, he knew that he had been basely deserted. Miss Richardia was still at the piano, letting her fingers run in delicate little harmonies up and down the keyboard. Tregarvon meant to keep his distance, but she drew him so irresistibly that he was beside her before he realized that he was once more breaking all the good resolutions. “Don’t go just yet,” he pleaded, when she looked around, saw that the others were gone, and made as if she would rise. Then he added: “It isn’t my fault this time: I didn’t wish to come, but Poictiers had accepted for me. You mustn’t punish me when I don’t deserve it.” She looked up at him with the air of detachment which he had always found more trying than her sharpest accusations. “Why should I punish you at all? Hasn’t your conscience been doing that much for you?” “Don’t!” he begged again. “Now that it is all over, I am going to tell you that I have been a liar and a hypocrite.” She stopped him with a quick little gesture of dismay. “Please don’t spoil it all now--just because we happen to be alone together for a minute or two. When are you going home to marry Miss Wardwell?” “You are perfectly merciless,” he complained. “Must we talk about Elizabeth?” “Ask your conscience,” she retorted. “My conscience is busy and doesn’t want to be disturbed. One would think you had been born and bred in New England!” “I wasn’t; I was born on this mountain.” He sat down in the nearest chair and tried to remember that he was talking to the woman who was as good as promised to Poictiers Carfax. “I know,” he offered; “in a rambling old house with a groved lawn. It has a box-bordered carriage drive, and a big, pillared veranda fronting the west.” “Yes; when have you ever seen Westwood House?”