And suppose a miracle happened and Mr. Galbraith was large-minded enough still to hold out to him the former offer? Should he wish to accept it? Would it not be almost charity? No, if he refused Cynthia's hand--and that was what, in bald terms, it would amount to--he must decline the other favor as well and be independent of the Galbraiths for good and all. Otherwise his position would be unendurable. It was an odious situation, the one in which he found himself. Only a cad cast a woman's heart back at her feet. The unchivalrousness of the act grated upon every fiber of his sensitively attuned, high-minded nature. Yet, as Madam Lee had reminded him, would he not be doing Cynthia a greater injustice if he married her without love. Friendship and brotherly affection were all he could honestly bestow, and although these he gave with all sincerity, as he now examined his heart in the light of the revelations real love had brought, he realized that beyond their confines existed a realm into which Cynthia Galbraith, fair though she was, had never set foot. No woman had crossed that magic threshold until now, when her presence stirred all the blended emotions of his manhood. Humility, tenderness, reverence possessed him; self descended from its throne of egoism and yielded its scepter to another; the hot blood of the primitive, untamed Viking raced in his veins. Soul, mind, heart, body were all awakened. He was a dolt who confused genuine passion with the milder preferences of callow youth. Delight Hathaway was his mate, created for him before the hills in order stood. It was as inevitable that they should come together as that the river should sweep out to meet the sea, or the lily open to the kiss of the sunlight. All that this woman was in purity, in graciousness of heart, in brilliancy of intellect he loved, adored, approved; all that she was in physical beauty he reverenced and coveted. Her lot had been strangely cast and the scope of it limited to a very narrow vista. Oh, for success to place at her feet the riches of the earth! With such a goal to lure one on what was toil! Faugh! He laughed aloud at the word. Madam Lee, with her unerring intuition, had probed his heart and read his destiny aright.