"What's the matter with you, sir?" Margaret said to her cousin. "You don't seem to be quite yourself; is it the weather? Reginald is duller and more silent than usual, he has hardly spoken a word to-day." "No, it's not the weather," he replied, sharply. "I want to ask you a question, Margaret." "Well, if you ask it civilly," the girl replied, "I will answer it, but certainly not otherwise." "I hear that that sailor fellow has been coming here several times. What does it mean?" Margaret Carne threw back her head haughtily. "What do you mean, Ronald, by speaking in that tone; are you out of your mind?" "Not more than the family in general," he replied, grimly; "but you have not answered my question." "I have not asked Lieutenant Gulston what he comes here for," she said, coldly; "and, besides, I do not recognise your right to ask me such a question." "Not recognise my right?" he repeated, passionately. "I should have thought that a man had every right to ask such a question of the woman he is going to marry." "Going to marry?" she repeated, scornfully. "At any rate this is the first I have heard of it." "It has always been a settled thing," he said, "and you know it as well as I do. You promised me ten years ago that you would be my wife some day." "Ten years ago I was a child. Ronald, how can you talk like this! You know we have always been as brother and sister together. I have never thought of anything else of late. You have been home four or five months, anyhow, and you have had plenty of time to speak if you wanted to. You never said a word to lead me to believe that you thought of me in any other way than as a cousin." "I thought we understood each other, Margaret." "I thought so too," the girl replied, "but not in the same way. Oh, Ronald, don't say this; we have always been such friends, and perhaps years ago I might have thought it would be something more; but since then I have grown up and grown wiser, and even if I had loved you in the way you speak of, I would not have married you, because I am sure it would be bad for us both. We have both that terrible curse in our blood, and if there was not another man in the world I would not marry you." "I don't believe you would have said so a month ago," Ronald Mervyn said, looking darkly at her. "This Gulston has come between us, that's what it is, and you cannot deny it." "You are not behaving like a gentleman, Ronald," the girl said, quietly. "You have no right to say such things." "I have a right to say anything," he burst out. "You have fooled me and spoilt my life, but you shall regret it. You think after all these years I am to be thrown by like an old glove. No, by Heaven; you may throw me over, but I swear you shall never marry this sailor or any one else, whatever I do to prevent it. You say I have the curse of the Carnes in my blood. You are right, and you shall have cause to regret it."