"Are you sure you want me?" "I've been sure of that--too sure for my peace of mind since the first day I saw your dear face--the loveliest on earth. But I never thought to have you. I never thought that I would have a right to ask, for I'm poor--horribly poor." "Oh, as if that mattered!" "I know it doesn't now, for this that's happened has given us to each other. I'll work hard and make money. Nothing can part us--I couldn't bear it. But it seems too good to be true. Is it possible you care for me?" "I think I've cared--ever since the first few days. I'd never guessed that I would meet a man like you. But oh, I did not mean to marry _any_ man." "I know, darling. I know what you'd planned. I lay awake nights over it, wondering if, beggar as I was, I couldn't snatch you from that cold future. But I shouldn't have thought I had the right if this thunder-bolt hadn't struck me." "As Aunt Kathryn--poor Aunt Kathryn!--is always saying, 'It must have been meant.' I never promised that--that I would join the Sisters, you know. I suppose this is why my father would have me go abroad when I came of age. He was afraid I might make up my mind before I had--found my heart." "Have you found it now--for sure?" "No. I--I've _lost_ it." "Angel! But you've got mine instead. You won't mind marrying a beggar and being a beggaress?" The adorable creature laughed. "I shall love it," she said. There was no one in the hall except Airole, and the shadows were asleep--so I kissed her: and knew why I had been born. I'd often wondered, but I never will again. We had a fierce tussle with the Countess to prevent her stopping in Montenegro and marrying her Prince there and then, as soon as might be. The truth was, and she owned it, that she was afraid to face Beechy till she had been made irrevocably a Princess. But finally we prevailed, almost by force, and tore the poor lady from her lover, who protested that he would follow, were it to the world's end. I believed he would, too, for he had threatened to be the last man in Maida's world; the Countess was now the last woman in his, and he would hold on to her and her money as a drowning man grasps at a substantial spar. I shall never forget that drive down from the mountain land where a King rode to fetch a fairy bride. At Cattaro we took the fishing boat which had carried me yesterday; and I think the sailor-men realized, when they saw what I had brought back, that I wasn't a madman after all. Then the spin from Castelnuovo to Ragusa that I had taken in such a different mood fifteen hours before. And at Ragusa, Beechy, still pale and shaken, springing up from her sofa to meet Maida and me as we opened the door. Ralph sprang up too, and his chair had been drawn so close to her sofa that the rush of her white wrapper--or whatever it was--upset it. "Where's Mamma?" came the first question, as was natural.