But when he ceased she came to. The little awakening sigh she gave was the little fluttering sigh of a patient when the anesthetic leaves the senses clear. She looked at her George. Horrible to dim the sparkling in those dear eyes, radiant with excitement, with love. Yet she did it. The goody-goody little soul of her put its hands about the little weakness of her and held it tight. She said: “I do, _do_ see what you mean, Georgie. But I do, _do_ think it's wrong.” And then the little hands and the brown fist changed places. For she put one hand below the fist, and with the other patted as she gave her little homily--goody-goody little arguments, Sunday-school little arguments, mother-and-child little arguments. And very timidly she concluded: “You are not angry, Georgie, are you?” This splendid George of hers gave her a tremendous kiss. “You're a little saint; you're a little idiot; you're a little angel; you're a little goose,” he told her. “But I love you all the more for it, although I'd like to shake you. I _would_ like to shake you, Mary. You're ruining the finest joke that ever was tried; and you're ruining our only chance of marrying; and goodness only knows what's going to happen now.” She laughed ever so happily. It was intoxicating to bend this dear George; intoxicating to have the love that came of bending him. “But I _am_ right, am I not?” she asked. George said: “Look here, saint and goose. I'm simply not going to chuck the thing and all our happiness like this. I'll make a bargain. Saint and goose, we'll say you are right, but you shall have one night to think over it. One night. And this afternoon you will go to Professor Wyvern and tell him everything and hear what he thinks about it--what an outsider thinks: see? Yes, that's it. Don't even spend a night over it. Have a talk with Professor Wyvern, and if you still think I ought to chuck it, write to me at once, and to-morrow I'll come down and creep in unto my uncle with the cat, and say: 'Uncle, I have sinned.' There, Mary, that's agreed, isn't it?” “That's agreed,” she joined. “Yes, that's fair.” He looked at his watch. “I must cut. I must catch the one-thirty train. I must calm Bill and the 'tec. in case you--Mary, _do_ weigh whatever Wyvern says, won't you?” She promised; gave her George her hope that the Professor would make her see differently. “That's splendid of you!” George cried. “Saint and goose, that's sweet of you. Mary, I'm sure he will. Look here, I must fly; come half-way to the station. The cat's all right here. Pop up and feed her this afternoon.” They pressed the door behind them; hurried down the path. It was precisely as they turned from the lane into the high-road, that Mrs. Major, a cat beneath her arm, went bounding wildly through the copse towards Herons' Holt. CHAPTER IV. George Has A Shot At Paradise. I.