“I mean, of course--I do not understand--I am looking for Ronny.” “Ronny is quite safe,” said Jacynth gravely. “He is still at cricket with Harold. What I have to say does concern him though, a little.” “Concern Ronny!” There was a genuine note of alarm in the girl’s fresh voice, and she looked up at Jacynth with a wistful trouble in her eyes. “Concern Ronny! Why, what have you to say about Ronny?” “Can you give me a few moments?” he asked. “It is quiet here.” He pointed to a pathway more secluded than the rest, a pathway with a rustic garden chair, a deserted pathway. “Shall we sit here for a minute?” he said, and they walked to the rustic seat, and sat down side by side. There was a curious look of alarm in the hazel-colored eyes, but Jacynth did not notice it, for he was looking down, tracing a word upon the ground with his stick, and the word that he traced was the word he had used but now, Kismet. “What do you want to say to me?” He could hear a hard ring in her voice, and looking up he saw a hardness in her eyes, and his lips trembled. “We have been very good friends,” he began, and faltered. She caught him up. “We have been good friends,” she said. “If you wish us to be good friends any more you will not say what it is just possible that you may think of saying. There are some words which will estrange us for ever.” Jacynth looked at her despairingly. How exquisitely lovely she looked, like some angel of youth, some vision of summer in that autumnal garden. His heart seemed to be beating very fast, his eyes were hot, and his lips dry, and his hands trembled feverishly. “Listen!” he said, and as he spoke his own voice sounded far away and unfamiliar like the voice of some shadow encountered in a dream. “Listen! I love you with all my heart. Hush! let me say what I have got to say”--for she had turned to him, half appealing, as if to interrupt his declaration--“I daresay you may think it very audacious of me to love you--or, at least, for I could not help loving you, to tell you so. I know that you are beautiful enough and good enough to be addressed by better men than I. I should have been content with my secret love and held my peace. But I couldn’t--I couldn’t.” He paused for a moment. She laid her hand on his gently, and he trembled at her touch. “I am very sorry,” she began, but he went on again wildly: “I am not quite a fool. Men who are not quite fools either say that I have a great career before me. I have made something of a name as it is, although I may still almost speak of myself as a young man. You shall be proud of me, indeed, I promise you that, if you will only let me serve you. Life is all a game of chances, but if you will take this chance, I do not think that you will regret it. Your lover will not be quite unworthy of your love.” “I am very, very sorry,” she said, “but you have said the words which must divide us. I did like you, I do like you very much, but we cannot be friends any more.”