"You ought; for if I had not done that, you wouldn't now be engaged to Caro; and you'll be so happy with her." Lawrence moved uneasily. He glanced about him indefinitely. It did not seem to him as if he could abruptly walk away from this girl. "Are you very tired of me?" she unexpectedly inquired. "Do you want me to go up to the house and tell Caro you are waiting here?" Here she laughed, the sound ringing out in the still air. But before he could reply, the girl had risen to her feet. Lawrence rose quickly also. "Are you going?" he asked. "I bore you so," she said. She was standing before him, her hands clasped and hanging down in front of her. Her face was turned to him, but her eyelids were drooped. He gave a short laugh. He tried to speak, but his tongue blundered over the words. At last he said, constrainedly, "You speak that which is not." Then he tried to laugh again. Prudence looked about her rapidly. She took a step nearer to her companion. "It isn't in the least likely that we shall ever be alone together again," she said, in a half voice; "so why need we quarrel?" "Why, indeed? I have forgiven you, and we are going to be friends. Isn't that our attitude towards each other?" Prudence clasped her hands. "Oh, Rodney, you don't forgive me, and you don't like me any more!" He stood silent, grimly looking at the woman before him. "I can't go on with my life thinking you bear me ill-will,--I tell you I can't!" she said. "But I don't bear you ill-will. If Lord Maxwell had not married some one else, do you think you would have experienced this access of repentance?" The instant Lawrence had spoken thus he would have given much to be able to take back the words. But the sting of bitter memory, the recollection of past suffering, overwhelmed him. Prudence turned so white that it almost seemed as if she would fall. But she did not fall; she stood up straight and stiff. Even her lips appeared to be stiff, for she tried twice to speak before she said: "Mr. Lawrence, will you give me that ring? Leander says you have it again." For answer Lawrence put his thumb and finger in his waistcoat pocket, and drew forth a ring in which was set a large, dark red stone. He held out the trinket in silence, and laid it in the palm of the extended hand. "I believe this is the end," he said, after a moment. Her whole aspect changed in a flash. She smiled while she closed her fingers over the ring. She was glancing at some object behind Lawrence. "It's not the end," she responded, in a low voice; "it's what I call the sequel." Then, louder, "I'm glad you've come, Caro, for I don't know what would have happened if we had been left to ourselves, Mr. Lawrence is that belligerent. We have quarrelled about everything we've mentioned."