“My dear man, do you suppose for a moment that I had any intention of marrying you? Nothing would have induced me to do it.” “What do you mean?” he cried. “I’ve reached an age when I can’t imagine that it would be worth while sacrificing five thousand a year for any man. Besides, you’re charming as a friend, but as a husband you’d be quite insufferable. I wouldn’t marry you if I were starving and you had all the wealth of Golconda.” “D’you mean to say you’ve been playing with me all the time?” “I’m afraid that is precisely what it comes to.” He drew away from her, and his face took that rather peevish expression of a spoilt child which it sometimes had. “I think it’s very cruel of you,” he said. “Let us forget all about it. You’re perfectly free and there’s no need whatever for you to marry me. Let us be friends. And don’t flirt any more with widow-ladies; they’re dreadfully dangerous.” “I daresay it’s a very good joke to you, but you’ve exposed me to the most awful humiliation. You ask me to be friends, but I shall never be able to look you in the face again.” Mrs. Fitzherbert ceased to smile and her eyes became quite grave. “Shall I tell you a secret that I’ve never divulged to any living soul?” she said. “Perhaps you’ll understand why I couldn’t resist the chance you gave me. I daresay you’ve forgotten that five-and-twenty years ago we used to see a great deal of one another. Perhaps you never knew that I was so desperately in love with you then that I would have married you if you hadn’t a penny in the world, and I would have been glad to scrub the floors you walked on.” The Canon started and was about to speak. But with a little laugh she stopped him. “Oh, please don’t make any observation yet. Even now it makes me feel rather silly to speak about it. I daresay you flirted with a good many other girls as much as you did with me, but I was foolish enough to think you cared for me. And I thought you meant to ask me to marry you. Then you met Dorothy Frampstone, and you married her instead. Well, it’s very possible that she was much nicer than I, but you mustn’t be surprised if my vanity leads me to think there were much more solid reasons. I have an idea you transferred your affections to her chiefly because she had six hundred a year while I was penniless, and she was the daughter of a peer of the realm while I was nobody in particular.” “You do me an injustice,” he murmured. “Anyhow it doesn’t matter, it’s all very long ago. The important thing is that I did love you then really, so if I’ve made you feel a little ridiculous now, it’s only tit for tat.” She held out her hand, smiling, and he warmly grasped it. “You’re a wonderful woman, and I was a fool five-and-twenty years ago. The fates have been against me all along.” “And now good-night,” she laughed. “It’s growing late, and it’s really very compromising for a lone, lorn widow to remain so long _en tête-à-tête_ with a fascinating person like yourself.”