"Well, I don't know. I suppose he was after his way. I don't think louts like that can be very much in love to signify. Young men when they look like that would do with one girl as well as another." "I don't see that at all," said Nina. "I am sure he would if he'd only try. At any rate what's the good of his going on? They can't make a girl marry unless she chooses." "Won't he be rich?" "Awfully rich," said Ayala. "Then I should think about it again," said the young lady from Rome. "Never," said Ayala, with an impressive whisper. "I will never think about it again. If he were made of diamonds I would not think about it again." "And is that why you were changed?" said Nina. "Well, yes. No; it is very hard to explain. Aunt Emmeline told me that--that I encouraged him. I thought I should have rushed out of the house when she said that. Then I had to be changed. I don't know whether they could forgive me, but I could not forgive her." "And how is it now?" "It is different now," said Ayala, softly. "Only that it can't make any real difference." "How different?" "They'd let me come if I would, I suppose; but I shall never, never go to them any more." "I suppose you won't tell me everything?" said Nina, after a pause. "What everything?" "You won't be angry if I ask?" "No, I will not be angry." "I suppose there is someone else you really care for?" "There is no one," said Ayala, escaping a little from her friend's embrace. "Then why should you be so determined against that poor young man?" "Because he is a lout and a beast," said Ayala, jumping up. "I wonder you should ask me;--as if that had anything to do with it. Would you fall in love with a lout because you had no one else? I would rather live for ever all alone, even in Kingsbury Crescent, than have to think of becoming the wife of my cousin Tom." At this Nina shrugged her shoulders, showing that her education in Italy had been less romantic than that accorded to Ayala in London. CHAPTER XVI. JONATHAN STUBBS.