"I said unpleasant, didn't I? When an enemy dies it's all joy. When a friend passes over to eternal bliss, why, being good Christians, we are not so faithless and selfish as to let the momentary separation distress us." "But what is it? You're trying to gain time by all this beating about the bush. You ought to know me well enough to know you can speak straight out." "Fanshaw's suing his wife for divorce--and he names Jack." "Is that your news?" said Gladys, languidly. Suddenly she flung aside the robes and sat up. "What's Pauline going to do? Can she--" Gladys paused. "Yes, she can--if she wishes to." "But--will she? Will she?" demanded Gladys. "Jack doesn't know what she'll do," replied Langdon. "He's keeping quiet--the only sane course when that kind of storm breaks. He had hoped you'd be there to smooth her down, but he says when he opened the subject of your going back to Saint X you cut him off." "Does she know?" "Somebody must have told her the day you left. Don't you remember, she was taken ill suddenly?" "Oh!" Gladys vividly recalled Pauline's strange look and manner. She could see her sister-in-law--the long, lithe form, the small, graceful head, with its thick, soft, waving hair, the oval face, the skin as fine as the petals at the heart of a rose, the arched brows and golden-brown eyes; that look, that air, as of buoyant life locked in the spell of an icy trance, mysterious, fascinating, sometimes so melancholy. "I almost hope she'll do it, Mowbray," she said. "Jack doesn't deserve her. He's not a bit her sort. She ought to have married--" "Some one who had her sort of ideals--some one like that big, handsome chap--the one you admired so frantically--Governor Scarborough. He was chock full of ideals. And he's making the sort of career she could sympathize with." "Scarborough!" exclaimed Gladys, with some success at self-concealment. "I detest him! I detest 'careers'!" "Good," said Langdon, his face serious, his eyes amused. "That opens the way for my other shock." "Oh, the good news. What is it?" "That I'd like it if you'd marry me." Gladys glanced into his still amused eyes, then with a shrug sank back among her wraps. "A poor joke," she said. "I should say that marriage was a stale joke rather than a poor one. Will you try it--with me? You might do worse." "How did you have the courage to speak when I'm looking such a wreck?" she asked with mock gravity. "But you ain't--you're looking better now. That first shock braced you up. Besides, this isn't romance. It's no high flight with all the longer drop and all the harder jolt at the landing. It's a plain, practical proposition." Gladys slowly sat up and studied him curiously. "Do you really mean it?" she asked. Each was leaning on an elbow, gazing gravely into the other's face. "I'd never joke on such a dangerous subject as marriage. I'm far too timid for that. What do you say, Gladys?"