"But you don’t love him, Eloise, surely—" I arose, the stars whirling above my head, the great trees soughing as in sorrow. She came up in the starlight and put her arms around my neck. She tried to laugh and pull me back to our seat. "Jack," she said, "I want you to help me—will you not do something—the last something I shall ever ask you for?" "I love you enough to give you my life," I said. "You were always so good to me. It is this, Jack—our secret: Colonel Goff and I will be married as soon as he can arrange to go back to England, in a month or two. I don’t want any scene with Aunt Lucretia, and so, and so, Jack, we’ll just make-believe—let her believe it is all right—that we are carrying out her plans up to the very day." "I’ll say nothing," I answered; "you and Aunt Lucretia can arrange it." "You’ll have to act as if you loved me, Jack." "I cannot act any other way," I said. She laughed, her voice floating up triumphantly. "And you will have to send me that diamond ring, you know—" "Eloise," I said again, after a moment, "this is desecration! You know you don’t love that old man!" "I like him enough to be the Countess of Carfax. If I’ve got to be sold to anyone, Jack," she said with bitterness, "got to be traded off like a Jersey, why I’d rather be traded off as the Countess of Carfax than any other way!" I flushed hot. "But Jack, think of grandfather. It is that or be turned out." "Eloise," I cried, "you know I wouldn’t stand for that!" "No," she whispered softly, "not if you could help. But Jack, I forgot to tell you, you are already out." I could only look my astonishment. "I wanted to write you," she went on, "but I was afraid. I learned it all from Braxton Bragg." "What did he have to do with it?" "You know he has had a silly idea that he was going to marry me himself some day, though you know how I have always despised him. Well, Jack, you’ll never know what he has done; because you don’t know the conditions on The Home Stretch. I, myself, didn’t, till Braxton Bragg showed me the papers the very month you left. You know how grandfather has always kept that secret drawer in his safe locked? But you remember how we children learned all about it?" "I remember Braxton showed it to me," I said. "I never knew how he found it out." "Nor I, nor how he stole the parchment from it, the one that grandfather kept from all eyes, even Aunt Lucretia’s, for she knows nothing of it yet. But he did, and he showed it to me, thinking—well, you’ll guess why. Jack, we’re outcasts, you and I, we have nothing."