If she was cool, he was calm; he was not at all as he had been the night before; then he had seemed hurried and irritated, now he was quiet. "The experiment has succeeded," he said, deliberately. "I find myself often thinking of you; I like to be with you; I feel when with you a sort of satisfied content. What I want to ask is--I may as well say it at once--Will not this do as the basis of a better understanding between us?" She was gazing at the purple slopes of Monte Morello opposite. "It might," she answered. He turned; her profile was towards him, he could not see her eyes. "I shall be quite frank," he continued; "under the circumstances it is my only way. You have loved some one else. I have loved some one else. We have both been unhappy. We should therefore, I think, have a peculiar sympathy for and comprehension of each other. It has seemed to me that these, combined with my real liking for you, might be a sufficient foundation for--let us call it another experiment. I ask you to make this experiment, Margaret; I ask you to marry me. If it fails--if you are not happy--I promise not to hold you in the slightest degree. You shall have your liberty untrammelled, and, at the same time, all shall be arranged so as to escape comment. I will be with you enough to save appearances; that is all. In reality you shall be entirely free. I think you can trust my word." "I shall have but little from my aunt," was her answer, her eyes still fixed upon the mountain. "I am not her heiress, as you suppose." "You mean that to be severe; but it falls harmless. It is true that I did suppose you were her heiress; but the fact that you are not makes no difference in my request. We shall not be rich, but we can live; it shall be my pleasure to make you comfortable." "I do not quite see why you ask this," she said, with the same slow utterance and her eyes turned away. "You do not love me; I am not beautiful; I have no fortune. What, then, do you gain?" "I gain," he said--"I gain--" Then he paused. "You would not like me to tell you," he added; and his voice was changed. "I beg you to tell me." Her lips were slightly compressed, a tremor had seized her; she seemed to be exerting all her powers of self-control. He watched her a moment, and then, leaning towards her while a new and beautiful expression of tenderness stole into his eyes, "I gain, Margaret," he said, "the greatest gift that can be given to a man on this earth, a gift I long for--a wife who really and deeply loves me."