“There’s one thousand dollars sure, if anything should happen to me,” he said. “That beats any old elusive two thousand that Tom Nelson may have.” “You’re a dear, good, faithful boy, Harry,” she said impulsively, and she gave him a kiss. That was happiness enough for that day and the next, but on the third he began to get down to earth again and deemed the time propitious. “You’ll marry me?” he suggested. “Perhaps,” was her reply. “Perhaps!” he cried. “It’s always perhaps.” “Perhaps it won’t be always perhaps,” she returned. In truth, she had wavered so long that she found it difficult to make up her mind. Besides, Tom was prospering, Tom was devoted, and Tom was a nice fellow. True, he was twenty-six while she was only eighteen, and Harry, at twenty, was nearer her own age, but—well, aside from any question of the future, it was rather nice to have two men so devotedly attentive. Then, too, Tom spent his money more freely, and she derived the benefit in present pleasures. There was no hurry; the future was now brighter, whichever she chose, and, things being so nearly equal, there was even less reason for haste. Alice, in addition to her dread of poverty, was a natural flirt: she enjoyed the power she exerted over these two men. But she said nothing to Tom of Harry’s latest move; perhaps she thought it would be unfair, or perhaps she was a trifle truer to Harry than to Tom. Harry, in his “simple” way, misinterpreted this irresolution. He was too devoted to criticize; he had begun to understand her dread and to think that she was quite right in taking such a very worldly view of the situation. Why should she not, so far as possible, endeavor to make her future secure? It was for him to convince her of his thoughtfulness and his ability to provide for her. Thereupon he got an accident insurance policy. “You’re awfully thoughtful, Harry,” she said. “I like you.” “I don’t want you to worry,” said Harry, flattered and pleased. “I’m not worrying,” she told him. “But I am,” he retorted ruefully. “Men,” she asserted, “are _so_ impatient.” Harry could not quite agree to this—he thought he had been wonderfully patient. In his straightforward way he began to ponder the matter deeply. It had seemed to him he was doing a wonderfully clever thing that ought to settle the matter definitely. Had he made a mistake? If so, what was necessary to rectify it? Incidentally, he heard that some of Tom Nelson’s little speculations had turned out favorably, and Tom was still quite as devoted as ever and seemed to be received with as much favor. Then to Harry came an idea—a really brilliant idea, he thought. “Perhaps,” he told himself, “I ought not to have assigned that policy to her; perhaps I ought to have kept it in my control so that a wedding would be necessary to give her the benefit of it. As it is now, she has the policy, no matter whom she marries. I don’t think she would—”