His face flushed, his heart warmed with his words; all the passionate love that he really felt for her woke within him. There was no feigning, no pretense--it was all reality. It was not Darrell Court he was thinking of, but Pauline, peerless, queenly Pauline; and in that moment he felt that he could give his whole life to win her. "Let me pray my prayer," he repeated; "let me tell you how dearly I love you, Pauline--so dearly and so well that if you send me from you my life will be a burden to me, and I shall be the most wretched of men." She did not look proud of angry, but merely sorry. Her dark eyes drooped, her lips even quivered. "You love me," she rejoined--"really love me, Captain Langton?" He interrupted her. "I loved you the first moment that I saw you. I have admired others, but I have seen none like you. All the deep, passionate love of my heart has gone out to you; and, if you throw it from you, Pauline, I shall die." "I am very sorry," she murmured, gently. "Nay, not sorry. Why should you be sorry? You would not take a man's life, and hold it in the hollow of your hand, only to fling it away. You may have richer lovers, you may have titles and wealth offered to you, but you will never have a love truer or deeper than mine." There was a ring of truth about his words, and they haunted her. "I know I am unworthy of you. If I were a crowned king, and you, my peerless Pauline, the humblest peasant, I should choose you from the whole world to be my wife. But I am only a soldier--a poor soldier. I have but one treasure, and that I offer to you--the deepest, truest love of my heart. I would that I were a king, and could woo you more worthily." She looked up quickly--his eyes were drinking in the beauty of her face; but there was something in them from which she shrank without knowing why. She would have spoken, but he went on, quickly: "Only grant my prayer, Pauline--promise to be my wife--promise to love me--and I will live only for you. I will give you my heart, my thoughts, my life. I will take you to bright sunny lands, and will show you all that the earth holds beautiful and fair. You shall be my queen, and I will be your humblest slave." His voice died away in a great tearless sob--he loved her so dearly, and there was so much at stake. She looked at him with infinite pity in her dark eyes. He had said all that he could think of; he had wooed her as eloquently as he was able; he had done his best, and now he waited for some word from her. There were tenderness, pity, and surprise in her musical voice as she spoke to him. "I am so sorry, Captain Langton. I never thought you loved me so well. I never dreamed that you had placed all your heart in your love." "I have," he affirmed. "I have been reckless; I have thrown heart, love, manhood, life, all at your feet together. If you trample ruthlessly on them, Pauline, you will drive me to desperation and despair."