She looked up with a shadow in her splendid eyes. “Oh, Talbot do you regret that I belong to you, beyond all chance of change?” she inquired. “No, darling. I would not exchange you for a kingdom,” he replied. His heart thrilled with happiness at the expression of radiant joy that beamed upon her face. She stole her dainty hand into his one moment as she said, softly: “Then, Talbot, I would rather be your wife than a king’s.” “Nina, you are an angel!” he exclaimed. “I believed that years must elapse before you would pardon my fault and love me again, and yet you have already filled my life with the bliss of your forgiving love. I do not know how to thank you enough for the mercy you have shown me. May God bless you forever, my sweet one.” She looked at him with a pretty, pensive smile. “Aunt Drusilla is quite disgusted with the readiness with which I have pardoned you,” she observed. “She says if she had been in my place she would have held you at arm’s length a year at least, before she condescended to forgive you and love you again.” “And what did you say to that old-maidish speech?” he inquired, smilingly. “I told her that she had never known what true love was, or she could not have fancied a loving wife being hard and cold to her husband when he came to her truly repentant for his fault.” “Wise, loyal little wife!” he exclaimed, fondly. “And what did my aunt say to that noble little speech?” “She answered that it was quite true she had never known anything about that kind of love and she hoped she never would, either, for women had made themselves fools over men ever since the world began, and would continue to do so to the end of the chapter.” “It was most fortunate that she did not succeed in imbuing your mind with her peculiar sentiments,” laughed Talbot Strangemore. “I shudder to think of the risk I ran in leaving you to her care all those years. She might have made a man-hater of you.” “Never, for I was in love with my husband long before I ever saw his Aunt Drusilla,” she answered, with a glance that set all his pulses beating with rapture. * * * * * The day after the governor’s reception Talbot and Nina went home to Selwyn Heights. Miss Strangemore had preceded them several days in order to have everything in readiness for their return. Kitty May had remained in the city with her mistress, and had received her share of lionizing as the brave girl who had captured Sibyl St. Alban in the jaunty dude’s costume under which she had cleverly masked her identity. Kitty had briefly narrated the manner in which she had been led to suspect the identity of the false woman.